Therapy dogs that visit children with cancer do not seem stressed by the work. That is the finding of a new study. The research was carried out by American Humane. Its publication was announced by the Human Animal Bond Research Institute, known as HABRI.
HABRI and Zoetis funded the project, called the Canines and Childhood Cancer Study. It is one of the largest studies of the human-animal bond to date. It looks at how animal-assisted interaction (AAI) affects young cancer patients and their parents. It also looks at the therapy dogs themselves.
Amy McCullough, PhD, led the study for American Humane. She said the dogs showed no rise in stress, either in behavior or in their bodies. As a result, she said, placing therapy dogs in this kind of setting does not put undue strain on them. She added that the findings will help American Humane, HABRI and practitioners keep animal welfare standards high.
How the dogs were studied
McCullough worked with two American Humane colleagues, Molly Jenkins, MSW, and Ashleigh Ruehrdanz, MPH. Together they oversaw data collection from handler-dog teams at five children’s hospitals across the United States. The goal was to measure the dogs’ stress during regular sessions with young cancer patients and their families.
The team filmed every session. Then they coded each dog’s behavior using an ethogram, a tool built to capture both friendly and stress-related actions. They counted how often each behavior appeared and gave it a score, coding more than 400 videos in total.
Handlers also completed a standard canine behavior survey, the C-BARQ, when they joined. After each session they reported on their dog’s behavior, the activities and the people involved. The data showed no significant increase in the dogs’ physical or behavioral stress during the pediatric oncology visits.
The researchers also tracked cortisol in the dogs’ saliva, which is a common stress marker. Nearly 600 samples were collected and analyzed during the study, and trained handlers took them with a swab. To set a baseline for each dog, five samples were averaged. Three were taken in the morning, at noon and at night. Another came when a trigger, such as the therapy bandana or vest, was introduced. The last was taken on arrival at the hospital. After that, a further sample was taken 20 to 30 minutes into each session. No significant difference turned up between baseline and session levels.
What it means
Steven Feldman is the executive director of HABRI. He said the project gives solid proof that hospital work does not harm therapy animals, as long as they are well trained and handled. More animals are now placed in hospitals to help patients, so people can be sure the dogs are fine, he said. Even so, he stressed that high standards of care still apply. Therapy animal groups, handlers and the hospitals they serve all share that duty.
The paper, by McCullough and colleagues, appeared in the journal Applied Animal Behaviour Science in 2017.
HABRI is a nonprofit. It keeps the biggest online collection of research on the human-animal bond anywhere in the world. It also funds studies on the health benefits of companion animals and shares the findings with the public. American Humane, founded in 1877, was the country’s first national humane organization.
