Some Patients Petting Their Way To Improved Mental Health

According to Katcher, a few controlled clinical trials researching human-animal relationships have been published. Most of this research is on AAT, and it provides evidence for the following outcomes:

• Depressed patients had increased socialization and decreased depression.

• Children with severe ADHD and conduct disorder had decreased aggressive behavior and improved attention.

• Patients with autism or developmental disabilities had increased socialization and improved attention.

• Patients with Alzheimer’s disease had improved attention and decreased aggression and anger.

Besides these controlled studies, Katcher said, “clinical and anecdotal evidence suggests that many patients with dissociative disorders and agoraphobia who have companion animals have decreased anxiety and increased social competence.”

These patients improved, he suggested, “Because [humans] evolved solving problems about animals; animals have the power to entrain our attention. And when we are around animals, we become more joyous, communicative, expressive, and calm.”

Not surprisingly, because of these outcomes and because of word-of-mouth referrals, these four modalities are becoming more widely used, with AAA being the most popular, said Gonser and Katcher.

Currently, there are three journals and several national and international conferences on animal-human relationships. The professionals most interested in this field are social workers and psychologists. In fact, Katcher thinks he is the only psychiatrist attending these conferences and contributing journal articles.

When asked why, he replied, “Psychiatry has become biologically based, less attuned to social environment. This is unfortunate because there is so much evidence that social support is a critical variable in the recovery from many serious biological disorders including psychiatric illnesses.”

Last September, Benedictine Hospital in Kingston, N.Y., began offering AAA and AAT on its locked 21-bed and 18-bed progressive mental health units.

The program’s 10 volunteers completed a six-week program that trained them to work with inpatients having a wide variety of illness including psychiatric disorders, explained Carolyn Siewers, an occupational therapy assistant who manages the program, oversees the volunteers’ sessions, and conducts some of the AAA and AAT sessions.

In AAA and AAT, the patients pet, cuddle, and hold the dogs while they talk about pets. Also, the patient usually has the dog perform a trick and rewards the dog for it.

In AAT, Siewers directs the conversation and patient’s behavior to meet specific goals. Thus, with the incorporation of these animals into therapy, most patients can learn and feel relaxed enough to meet and make small talk with a stranger, take directions, have appropriate eye contact, and develop other skills, said Siewers. “I know I’m doing animal-assisted therapy, and I am using the dog to work toward therapeutic goals,” she added, “but what seems to be important to the patients is that they get to pet and cuddle with a dog and [that] it feels so good.”

John Mitchell, M.D., the psychiatrist who works on the treatment team with Siewers, is very pleased with the program: “One of the biggest challenges [patients] face is relating to people to get their needs met. Many have difficulty communicating on all levels. . . . The dogs are a bridge to developing communication skills and confidence. . . . And they help reach patients who would otherwise be resistant to therapy.

“The fundamental change that results from this therapy is that patients are better able to communicate with and relate to others. Specifically, I found patients to be more animated, more expressive, more spontaneous, and less hindered by internal noise,” said Mitchell. He added that three patients who had not shown any improvement before attending AAT sessions made “memorable and significant progress” during these sessions.