Harry and his owner, Megan Kelly, are frequent visitors to the Intensive Care Unit at the Canberra Hospital. Photo: James Coleman.
Harry the cocker spaniel was an Australian-championship-winning show dog in a former life.
But over the past five years, he’s been “strutting his stuff” through the Canberra Hospital’s Intensive Care Unit (ICU) as part of a study to find out what role dogs can play in patient recovery.
In the words of his owner, Megan Kelly, he’s the “OG therapy dog”.
“He really knows how to be a bit of a poser,” she says.
“And I think it’s really important he provides a service because I’m probably one of the only non-medical people who speaks to the patients and families, and it’s a real circuit breaker when we come into the ward. People open up about their home life, their pets, and who they’re missing back at home and how they want to get better.”
The ICU is never going to be a nice place to be, but five years ago, Canberra Health Services (CHS) kicked off a study to find out how patients might be made to feel a little more comfortable by allowing specially trained therapy dogs to visit them.
They say the findings have been “overwhelmingly pawsitive”.
Megan Kelly with Harry. Photo: James Coleman.
“We recognise that therapy dogs in other areas brought a lot of positive benefits, but the research was very scant, so we undertook this research project to focus on long-term ICU patients, who have the highest amount of anxiety,” CHS researcher and advanced practice nurse Kathleen Cook says.
“We learn that a visit with the therapy dog significantly reduces patient anxiety and family anxiety as well. A reduction in pain was noticed as well, with no adverse effects and no transfer of infections.”
Harry was among five teams of dogs provided for the study by national not-for-profit Delta Therapy Dogs, which delivers therapy dog programs across Australia.
Delta Therapy Dogs provides services all over Australia. Photo: James Coleman.
The report, entitled Canine-Assisted Intervention for Anxiety in ICU Patients and Family Members, found that spending 15 minutes interacting with the dog reduced “self-reported symptoms of anxiety in ICU patients and their family members with no observed adverse effects”.
“Dogs were always controlled on a leash by the handler and were allowed to sit on the foot of the bed on a clean sheet or an adjoining chair (based on participant preference),” the study reads.
“Participants were allowed to pet or touch the dogs if they wished and were asked to perform hand hygiene with alcohol-based hand rub before and after canine-assisted intervention.”
All up, 141 people took part in the study – made up of 70 patients and 71 family members – with patients asked to rate themselves for anxiety and pain levels before and after the visit.
Anxiety levels were found to be “significantly decreased” after the visit, while pain scores were also “lower”.
Physiological signs, like heart rate, respiratory rate, and blood pressure, however, showed “no statistically significant differences”.
“There are a lot of long-term ICU patients that can spend anything from days to weeks to even months in ICU, and they were the ones that we really targeted, and they were the ones that really, really benefited,” Ms Cook says.
Staff loved having the dogs visit, too. Photo: James Coleman.
“It can bring a person so much joy when they’re stuck in what can be a really sterile environment. I’ve had some amazing feedback from patients, like ‘it gave me a lot of joy, made me feel human’. Even though the dog visit might only be 10 to 15 minutes, it leaves a really positive effect lingering on the patient’s wellbeing.
“People will walk around on a bit of a high, going, ‘Oh, the dogs came in today.'”
As it stands, dogs are allowed to visit other parts of the Canberra Hospital, including the neurology, paediatric, renal and aged-care wards.
Ms Cook knows of only one other hospital in Australia that currently allows dogs in ICU – St George Hospital in Sydney – but hopes the results of the study will prompt others to start similar programs.
“I hope other hospitals take it on, and … I’d like to see a research study done on the wellbeing of staff too.”
