Posted on 04/01/2002 2:47:13 PM PST by summer
March 29, 2002
Seizure-Alert Dogs May Get Seeing-Eye Status in FL [FL GOP lawmaker leads the nation] (NYT)
By DANA CANEDY
MIAMI, March 28 - For Connie Standley, the final indignity came when the manager of a fast food restaurant asked why she was bringing her service dogs into his business in the Florida panhandle when she was obviously not blind.
"He kept saying to me that these are not guide dogs," Ms. Standley, who has epilepsy, recalled of a trip home from the Grand Canyon last year. "I said, `No, they are seizure-alert dogs,' and he kept on saying he has never heard of that and `I don't want you in here.' "
For the rest of the trip, she ate in her car.
In the seven years since she bought her first service dog, Ms. Standley, who lives in Eustis, about 30 miles northwest of Orlando, has had to explain countless times that she relies on Alex, an 80-pound black Bouvier des Flandres, to keep her safe. Alex and his 4-year-old brother, Nathaniel, can detect the onset of a seizure by about half an hour and try to alert and protect her until it passes, she said.
Because most people have never heard of seizure-alert dogs, Ms. Standley and others who rely on them have been turned away from restaurants, stores and other public places where dogs that assist people who are blind or deaf are permitted by federal law.
In Florida, that may soon change. The State Legislature unanimously passed a bill last week that extends to people who have seizure disorders the right to be accompanied in public places by a trained service dog. If Gov. Jeb Bush signs it into law as expected, State Senator Anna Cowin, a Republican who pushed for the measure, said, Florida may be the first state to pass such a measure.
Federal law prohibits denying access or service in public places to people with service dogs, but does not define a service dog.
"The federal law is not specific as to what are service dogs," Senator Cowin said, "so when states go ahead and specify hearing and seeing-eye dogs that excludes seizure-alert dogs."
Senator Cowin said she had become interested in the issue after hearing stories of discrimination from patients of her husband, a surgeon. She intends, she said, to distribute Florida's bill at national legislative conferences.
"Certainly it could become a model for other states," Ms. Cowin said. "I think people are still unsure that there are such things as seizure-alert dogs. Even in the medical community it is not known quite well."
While there is little debate that the dogs can be taught to help people during seizures, some medical professionals and epilepsy organizations question whether the dogs can predict them.
"I kind of have mixed feelings about this," said Chuck Carmen, executive director for the Epilepsy Association of Central Florida. While Mr. Carman said he believed some dogs might be able to detect changes in their owners' behavior right before a seizure, he added: "I'm concerned that an average person hears seizure dogs and thinks they can go to the pound and get one that will sense their seizures. It will step out in traffic to keep you out of harm's way; it will keep you from falling down the stairs; but it will not predict a seizure."
Ms. Standley, 49, who has had seizures since a head injury in a car accident 14 years ago, disagrees. She says her dogs have saved her from harm and embarrassment.
"Before I had the dogs I was standing in my kitchen drying a glass out and I went down in a seizure and put a glass right through my hand," Ms. Standley said. Now, she said, the dogs will try to warn her by tugging on her clothes, barking and even pouncing on her if she appears to be ignoring them.
"I actually didn't know anything about these dogs," Ms. Standley said. Then she met Alex. "We were getting ready to go to Dairy Queen one night, and she was 8 months old, and she wrapped her 6-foot leash around my legs and whipped my legs out form underneath me. When I woke up I was mad at her and my guardian said to me, `That was the coolest thing,' and I said, `What happened?' He said, `She just laid across you, and you had a seizure."
Ms. Standley said her dogs anticipated her seizures about 80 percent of the time. Like other such dogs, they are trained to retrieve medicine, carry a phone to their owner and keep her immobile during a seizure. The assistance, Ms. Standley said, has given her greater freedom.
She said she used to stay close to home because the seizures could cause her to lose control of her bladder and bowel, but the early detection enabled her to prepare for seizures. "If that happens in a restaurant something like that can be devastating, so you are very grateful for these dogs."
A study of patients and their seizure-alert dogs by the University of Florida's epilepsy clinic in 1998 determined that some dogs do detect seizures, but the scientists did not have the money to investigate whether early detection was a spontaneous reaction or trainable behavior. Roger Reep, a professor at the university's College of Veterinary Medicine, who conducted the study, said dogs that appeared to detect seizures might be responding to changes in brain activity or body scents in people about to undergo seizures.
Whatever the reason for the phenomenon, demand for the dogs is increasing. One nonprofit agency that trains the dogs, Canine Assistants Inc. of Alpharetta, Ga., says it has placed 17 Golden and Labrador Retrievers with epileptic owners in seven years, expects to place 10 this year alone and has a waiting list for 60 dogs.
"We hope to expand the program because we're getting more requests," said Jennifer Arnold, executive director of Canine Assistants, who estimated that more than a thousand dogs might be in use throughout the country.
A Pennsylvania woman who obtained a seizure-response dog from the agency says the Florida legislation will help people with epilepsy everywhere.
"Something should be done to make it a law in all states," said the woman, Carol Folwell, 66, of Zelienople, who obtained Lindsey, her Golden Retriever, last year.
"It was my last resort," Ms. Folwell said. "She gets the phone for me to call for help; she goes downstairs to get the apartment manager. I keep my pills on the coffee table and, if I ask her, she gets those for me."
While such intervention can be critical to a person's quality of life, Professor Reep cautioned that people should be suspicious of anyone claiming they can train the animals to detect seizure.
Ms. Arnold said her agency distinguished between seizure-alert dogs and seizure-response dogs. Both can immensely improve the quality of life for people with epilepsy, she said. The Florida legislation, she added, will enhance their independence even more by making discrimination against them a second-degree misdemeanor punishable by up to 60 days in jail and a $500 fine.
Ms. Arnold said the law would at least give owners of the dogs the legal muscle to challenge anyone who denied them service or access at public facilities.
"They can say, `This is a seizure-response dog, and here is a copy of the Florida law,' " Ms. Arnold said. "It also gives you the ability to call the police if you absolutely have to be in somewhere and somebody won't let you in."
So, if you're not having a seizure, these dogs can cause one?
What's the advantage to that?
Oh, I got it: April Fool's, right?
If you've ever known somebody who has epilepsy, you probably wouldn't be laughing.
Dogs are pretty dang amazing, they can sense a lot more than people can. Just like your dog may not like some people and his fur may get ruffled, while others he takes an immediate liking too.
( Taffy, mine & Emily's girl, uses a dadblamed squeaky-ball to "talk." She can coax more weird sounds out of the bloody thing, and goes into panic/mourn mode when it "dies...." )
Seriously, in what seems now like another life and world entirely, I was a Schutzhund ( that's a
K-9 who "speaks" German so the Bad Guy can't mis-command him ) handler.
Working dogs are pretty amazing, and altho seizure-alert is a new wrinkle for me, I can see the value in them. Companion dogs are a great aid to people with all kinds of handicaps. And a dearer friend you will not find in this world.
As for the dogs, I know that many animals have sensitivities that are hard to explain. I have heard of animals who can predict the unset of an earthquake with some accuracy. My own dog is very alert to my mom, especially prior to her having a pace-maker implanted. The dog has on several occassions come to get me when my mom was having a problem. I think I have heard that fish in an aquarium will begin to swim different before an earthquake. I am not sure that it is a learned behavior, but rather a natural acute sense of their surroundings. Since grand mall seizures can be accompanied beforehand with an "aura", perhaps that is what the dog is sensing. I have also heard that there are ways of diverting a seizure by not allowing the person's head to cock or turn (for instance), or whatever else they might begin to do during the unset of a seizure.
STILL haven't found that 'Preview' button yet, huh?
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