Every year, nearly 13,000 children are diagnosed with cancer, and some 40,000 are receiving treatment. It’s a scary time for both the children and their families, and anything that helps make it less frightening is a good thing. Can dogs do that?

Those of us who love dogs already know how much they improve our lives, especially by providing absolute love and comfort when we most need it. This healing human-canine bond is the basis for the ever-growing use of therapy dogs in all sorts of settings, including nursing homes, retirement homes and schools, and as part of disaster-relief teams.

Therapy dogs have become common in hospitals as well, but access varies by institution. Dogs in hospitals raise general concerns about human safety, including increased infection risks, allergies, phobias and aversions. While there is a wealth of positive, anecdotal evidence for the benefit of animal-assisted therapy (AAT) in all these settings, there’s little hard evidence to verify it. To overcome remaining barriers to AAT as part of their treatment programs, hospital staff and risk managers need proof.

Enter the American Humane Association (AHA). With financial support from Zoetis, a global animal health company, and the Pfizer Foundation, a charitable offshoot of the international pharmaceutical giant, AHA is in the final stage of a rigorous, three-year, peer-reviewed, controlled study, “Canines and Childhood Cancer: Examining the Effects of Therapy Dogs with Childhood Cancer Patients and their Families,” or CCC for short.

The study aims to document the specific medical, behavioral and mental-health benefits AAT may have for children between the ages of 3 and 12 recently diagnosed with cancer, as well as for their families. The third and final clinical stage of the study includes 100 children receiving treatment at five participating children’s hospitals across the country, including Randall Children’s Hospital at Legacy Emanuel in Portland, Ore.

Janice Olson, MD, MHA, is medical director of the Children’s Cancer and Blood Disorders Program at Randall and manages its CCC study. “We have a long tradition of pet therapy, at least since I arrived 15 years ago. So when this study opportunity came up, I said, ‘Sure, why not?’ We already had dogs visiting in in-patient, so why not out-patient as well? Staff didn’t have any concerns. Everyone was more than happy to participate.”

According to Amy McCullough, AHA’s national director of humane research and therapy, the hospitals were selected because they had existing therapy dog programs. “It was difficult to recruit hospitals for the study,” Amy said. “Doing research [has an impact on] their resources and staff. Some only allowed therapy dogs one day a week, or in one room outside of the treatment clinic. It was interesting to see the differences between hospitals across the country in terms of how therapy dogs were used. There are no standards. Some hospitals were willing to modify their policies to allow for our study—for example, in how often dogs can visit and where.”

The study requires that the dogs be registered with a therapy dog organization, be credentialed and meet the participating hospital’s criteria. Some hospitals’ criteria exceeded those AHA would have required.

To answer the question, “What can we do to improve the day-to-day health, healing, and quality of life of children suffering from cancer, and the families who suffer along with them?” the study tracks blood pressure, heart rate and psychological responses in the kids, their families, and the staff and caregivers who enjoy the benefit of working with therapy dogs. (Sadly, 50 percent of the children and families enrolled in the study will not be spending time with the therapy dogs because they are in the control group required for the study to have validity.)

Ryker Halpin was diagnosed with leukemia in April 2014, the month he turned six. He and his parents, Allison and Matt Halpin, are enrolled in the CCC study at Randall. They have an English Mastiff at home, so Allison and Matt knew Ryker would be comfortable with visits from a therapy dog. Ryker had been in the hospital a week when they were approached about participating. “Given all the dreadful news we’d just gotten, it seemed like a great opportunity, something positive to look forward to,” said Allison.

Ryker was paired with Bailey, a five-year-old female yellow Lab, and her handler Kate Dernbach. Bailey visits Ryker and his parents once a week at the hospital; each visit lasts 15 minutes (give or take five minutes). They’ll do this for four months. After each session with Bailey, Ryker is asked questions about how he’s feeling, and his blood pressure and pulse are recorded. His parents are also asked a series of questions, and a sample of Bailey’s saliva is taken to monitor her stress level.

At the time this article was written, Bailey had visited Ryker four times. “The first couple of visits were pretty low-key because Ryker had been given a lot of steroids, was just not himself, withdrawn and quiet,” Allison said. “But when he came home, he talked about Bailey. Bailey was something for him to look forward to. The last visit, Ryker was just waking up, so was in bed; he asked Bailey to get into bed with him. He enjoys brushing her. She was there during a chemo treatment; she’s one more thing to take his mind off it all.”

Dernbach and Bailey have been volunteering at Randall for close to three years, visiting once a week and making appearances on every floor to see children with all sorts of illnesses. Dernbach is a mom and a cancer survivor, so the idea of participating in the CCC study appealed to her on many levels. “It’s so rewarding to go in and help. The dogs are a huge distraction from why the kids are there, so even if the visit is only 15 minutes, it’s good for them. Bailey has calmed and relaxed people. I know what a huge impact she makes.”

Bailey’s visits with Ryker got off to a slow start. “Maybe it was just that everyone was unsure, because of the study,” Dernbach said. “He didn’t want her on the bed, didn’t want to touch her. If that happens during a visit to other kids outside the study, we quietly leave. With Ryker, we had to stay. But by the third visit, he brushed her, and on the fourth visit, he was excited to see her, asked her to get up on the bed, had his hand on her the whole time while getting chemo. Bailey slept beside him, which he thought was funny because she’s a 70-pound Lab taking up the whole bed and he couldn’t straighten out his legs.”

Bailey and the other therapy dogs are also being closely studied. Researchers videotape the visits and dog behaviorists review the videos for signs of canine stress, such as excessive yawning and other body cues. They also measure the level of the stress hormone cortisol in the dogs’ saliva before and after visits to see if and how ATT has an impact on their physical and mental health. According to Dernbach, Bailey’s not allowed to see other children during study visits with Ryker to ensure that the data collected from her saliva samples is valid.

The good news: earlier stages of the study showed that the dogs did not have increased stress from their time with the children and families. In fact, their cortisol levels, on average, were lower after spending time with the children.

McCullough and AHA hope that the study results, which are expected sometime in 2015, will bolster efforts to expand the use of ATT as an affordable adjunctive treatment option for people of all ages and walks of life, with many sorts of illnesses in a variety of settings. Some of the already-documented benefits of ATT include relaxation and lowered blood pressure; improved social skills; and decreased stress, anxiety, loneliness and depression. “We encourage therapy dog handlers to get involved in programs like this,” said McCullough. “It’s a low-cost, accessible treatment, helping families in need.”

For the Halpins, the benefits of participating in the study are immediate and real. Even the survey questions asked of Ryker after each visit with Bailey, about his stress and anxiety, are helpful. “They ask him to rate things as very satisfactory, satisfactory or unsatisfactory. He expresses his feelings in so many ways when responding to the survey. As a parent, I get better insight to his feelings. He says he’s not stressed or scared, that he’s joyful. That reminds me to not project my feelings onto him. Ryker lights up when it’s a Bailey-visit day. He’s a shy guy; seeing Bailey helps.”

Such a simple thing—a visit from a therapy dog—provides powerfully healing benefits for patients young and old, as well as for their families and the staff who treat them. Here’s hoping the study’s results open even more doors to therapy dogs and their handlers very soon. No one should have to go without.

The diagnosis of cancer is life-altering for all who are touched by it. When a child or a loving pet bears this burden, the tragedy seems particularly unfair, and brings cancer’s arbitrary and random selection home on a whole new level. Today, cancer is the number-one natural killer of dogs, regardless of breed, gender or age. In Denver, Colo., a unique support program is helping young human and canine cancer patients cope with their illness.

Enter Anne Ingalls, Colleen Chambers and YAPS—Youth And Pet Survivors—a pen-pal program that pairs children who have cancer with dogs (and in one case, a cat) also suffering from the disease. The participating child-dog pairs currently number 10, with some having enjoyed relationships spanning the last several years.

Ingalls, a registered nurse specializing in pediatric oncology at Children’s Hospital in Denver, describes the inspiration for YAPS as a “divine spark.” The program took shape after Ingalls was invited to join the board of directors of the Animal Care Foundation.

“There was a lot of discussion about what sort of program we might create that would blend these two populations of veterinary patients and children,” she says. “Children with cancer are very restricted [as] to what outside environments they can be exposed to, because of the heightened risks of injury and infection. Hospitals enforce these restrictions very stringently. That’s why we came up with the pen-pal concept—to bypass those restrictions.”

Colleen Chambers, surgical technician and practicing manager of the surgery department at the Veterinary Referral Center of Colorado, keeps a book featuring pictures and biographies of all the participating animals. Dogs include Mary Jane, a Labrador; Sandy and Emma, both Golden Retrievers; a West Highland Terrier named Max; Ram, a Doberman-Labrador mix; and Bonkers, the program’s only cat.

“The children choose their own animal, often deciding on an animal that’s gone through the same type of cancer and treatments as they themselves have,” says Chambers. Each child also receives a copy of the book Annie Loses Her Leg but Finds Her Way, written by Sandra Philipson and illustrated by Robert Takatch, the true and very inspirational story of an animal who survives great adversity. A plush Annie doll also comes with the package.

After being paired, the children stay in touch with their dogs via letters and email. The owners of the canine participants respond for the dog. The owners, who include former teachers, educators and psychologists, are carefully screened to ensure their suitability and capacity to relate to the experiences and challenges that surround the disease.

The children are selected based on criteria that include energy levels and motivation. “I know a lot of these kids personally,” says Ingalls. “The nurses I work with also refer children to me, and I consider the factors of each case. It’s got to be something they want to do. We want their parents to support them, but not do the writing for them. Some kids who express interest initially look through the book and ultimately tell me that they’re just not up for it right now.”

One young man who recently made the decision to join YAPS is Sean Flanagan, an 18-year-old Denver resident. Sean’s canine partner is Boone, yellow Lab, who lost his right front leg. Sean and Boone met for the first time in late September at Bark in the Park, the annual YAPS picnic—one of several annual group events where kids, dogs, owners and families spend time getting to know one another, face to face.

“He’s great, he’s got so much energy,” says Sean of Boone. “He’s a lovable dog. We rode around together at the picnic in a golf cart, and he had his head in my lap.” In the basket behind the golf cart rode the Flanagan’s family dog, Maggie, a Miniature Schnauzer. “Maggie was the smallest dog there,” says Sean, “but she got along with everyone.”

Both the VRCC and nearby Colorado State University’s Veterinary Teaching Hospital are actively involved in exploring new cancer treatments in animal populations, providing advancements in the treatment and control of the disease, as well as hope for eventually declaring victory over it. CSU’s comparative oncology program rates as the largest of its kind in the U.S. Specialists in medical oncology, nutrition, radiation therapy, surgical oncology, pathology, physics and specialty nursing work in concert with researchers to implement state-of-the-art, individualized therapies in chemotherapy as well as photon and electron radiation.

Dr. Robyn Elmslie, a board-certified veterinary oncologist at VRCC, blends traditional medical approaches for fighting cancer with innovative treatments that include gene therapy for localized tumors and electrophoresis (see below).

YAPS offers therapy on an entirely different level, one that addresses the emotional component of the illness. Says Chambers, “There are a lot of pet therapy programs out there, but this one appears to be unique.”

Ingalls agrees, expressing her hope that other children’s hospitals and veterinary centers around the country might eventually add this program to their treatment options. She also hopes that one day, YAPS is international in scope.

“This could become a world phenomenon,” she says. “Ultimately, of course, part of the success will always depend upon the depth of the connection made between the child and the pet.” Often, strong and enduring relationships are forged between entire families, and the YAPS program becomes a healing experience for all involved.

“The kids get really attached to the animals,” says Chambers. “They’ll tell things to the animals they won’t tell to people, even family—they feel free to express their deepest fears. Animals are nonjudgmental, and they don’t carry the emotional stigmas that people do. They come through the experience of disease a lot stronger than most people.”
“I think it’s a good thing for kids with cancer and kids with disabilities to know they have someone to listen to them. It’s hard, sometimes, not to have anybody to listen to your stories,” says Sean.
 

Each year, guide dog schools—independent nonprofit organizations that provide guide dogs for blind and visually impaired individuals—breed close to 3,000 dogs. When so many intelligent, loving shelter dogs are in need of homes, why don’t guide dog schools rescue dogs like some of the other service-dog programs? The answer lies in the nature of the work guide dogs are required to do. Dog jobs, like people jobs, are task-specific and require specific temperaments, some of which can be selected for through breeding.

The term “service animal” was first used in the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act to describe an animal individually trained to provide assistance to a person with a disability. While at that time, guide dogs for the blind were the most familiar type of service animal, over the years, the variety of tasks service dogs carry out has increased to include dogs who perform some of the functions that an individual with a disability cannot perform for him- or herself, such as alerting people with hearing impairments, pulling wheelchairs, or carrying and picking up things for people with mobility issues.

Watching blind travelers confidently make their way through busy city traffic, you might think that the guide dog is doing the same thing—performing a task that the blind person cannot perform for him- or herself. In other words, it may appear that the dog is leading the blind person, but that’s not the case. Both of their lives depend on what the other one does, and neither is in total control at any given time. Neither dog nor person can cross the street alone without risk, but together, they do it efficiently and safely.

Purpose-Driven Programs
Prior to the mid-1960s, when schools began dedicating resources to in-house breeding programs, guide dog schools routinely employed rescued shelter dogs. Schools worked closely with shelter staff, who would periodically line up dogs they considered to have potential for evaluation by guide dog trainers. Dogs were tested for confidence, initiative and trainability. On average, one out of 30 shelter dogs drafted into the guide dog program finished the training.

Terry Barrett, director of training operations at Guide Dogs for the Blind (GDB) in San Rafael, Calif., says, “In our earliest days, the 1940s, most of our dogs came from animal shelters. It soon became evident that we were looking for something very specific: Dogs who not only had excellent health, intelligence and temperament, but also exhibited a willingness to work and thrived on praise.” GDB’s breeding program was started in an effort to ensure a consistent supply of dogs with those specific traits.

By the late 1970s, new socialization methods (raising puppies in home environments) were proving so successful that shelter dogs, most of whom came from disadvantaged or unknown backgrounds, became less likely candidates for the work. As guide dog work intensified and breeding programs were beefed up, opportunities for shelter dogs all but disappeared.
Although German Shepherds, Labrador Retrievers and Golden Retrievers are the most familiar types of guide dog, any confident, friendly, intelligent and willing dog—large enough for the harness but small enough to lie comfortably under a bus seat—is eligible. Boxers, Smooth-Coated Collies, Poodles, Dobermans, Border Collies and Australian Shepherds are increasingly finding employment as guides, as are their more genetically sound hybrid offspring.

Labrador Retrievers, who constitute about 60 percent of these working dogs, have proven to be the most successful guide worldwide, mainly because there is enough variation within the breed to meet blind students’ myriad needs. “The vast majority of our dogs are bred from our own specially selected stock, but a percentage are donated from other schools, through international programs and other means,” Barrett notes.

Regardless of lineage, guide dogs have distinct counter-intuitive characteristics in common. Because they are, to great extent, bred for a specific temperament, they are more like one another than they are like others of their particular breed. If they were children, their report cards would read: “Follows instruction, participates in class, very creative, assumes responsibility when necessary, shows leadership and works well in a group.”

Breeders aren’t selecting for these traits as much as they are selecting against others. They want a German Shepherd who is tractable, a bird dog who is not prey-driven, a herding dog who won’t nip people to negotiate busy pedestrian traffic. Unlike traditional breeders who select for niche traits such as pointing, herding or wire-haired coats, schools select for temperament characteristics that are broadly adaptable.

For decades, guide dog schools have conducted and recorded detailed observations on many thousands of dogs. This volume of information and the length of time it’s been collected have allowed schools to reliably classify and quantify temperament traits. Their ultimate goal is to find measurements that will predict guide dog success and estimate heritability of temperament traits that are important to working guide dogs.

Generally speaking, many dog temperament tests have proven to be ineffective and controversial. In addition, few tests account for the dramatic behavioral differences seen from one breed to another; what’s acceptable in a German Shepherd might be abnormal behavior in a Golden Retriever.

According to an article by Taylor and Mills in the Journal of Veterinary Behavior, Clinical Applications and Research (2006), what’s needed are systematic scientific tests that focus on the five key measurements of the quality of a temperament: purpose, standardization, reliability, validity and practicality. It would take a large number of dogs in a consistent setting to devise such a test, and this is where guide dog schools are getting involved.

For example, Guiding Eyes for the Blind, based in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., is working with trainer Suzanne Clothier on a novel temperament evaluation project that tracks the behavior of hundreds of dogs from puppyhood through maturity, investigating how best to identify, and then select for, a set of traits that reflects flexibility of behavior. As Jane Russenberger, senior director of the canine development center at Guiding Eyes for the Blind, observes, “Because we believe in it and, like other schools, need better temperament measures, Guiding Eyes is providing that opportunity by allocating large amounts of resources to conduct the temperament tests.”

Part of the drive to refine this process comes from the financial and emotional commitment made to each dog by both the school and the eventual handler. Although it varies from school to school based on geographic region, on average, it costs about $50,000 to graduate a person/dog team. This figure includes all costs divided by the number of teams the school graduates each year. (The 11 schools in the U.S. graduate about 1,500 to 2,000 teams annually.) The cost just to prepare a single dog for class is about $23,000.

Direct costs—breeding, feeding, vet care and puppy-raising expenses—consume about 25 percent of the budget. Another 20 percent goes into training dogs for class. About 35 percent goes into student selection, dormitory and class expenses, and follow-up services. Once the training is complete and the team returns home, it can be six months to a year before they are functioning optimally together. To assist in this process, schools continue to work with their graduates in their home locations. Some of the larger, better-funded schools provide follow-up services for the working life of the team, which can be eight years. (Everything is provided free of charge to qualified blind and visually impaired students.)

From Puppy to Partner
After being specifically bred for guide work, the young dogs spend more than a year in the home of puppy-raising families, where they learn good house behavior, form relieving patterns, and are socialized and introduced to the different environments in which they may someday be working. (Read more about puppy-raising here.)

Careful control of what happens to a young dog during this critical phase of development is a crucial part of producing sound guide dogs. This is the time during which youngsters learn the canine equivalent of “please and thank you.” It’s also the best time to evaluate their health and identify risk factors that could lead to problems later in life. As Barrett notes, “From the earliest stages of their lives, GDB puppies and their moms are cared for by a team of experts, including full-time veterinarians and technicians supported by consulting specialists and volunteers. As the pups grow, our veterinarians continue to monitor their health and well-being.”

All dogs are born with default positions that they revert to when stressed. The reaction can be anything from anxious whining to more serious issues such as biting. The higher the stress, the more pressure on the trigger. Puppy socialization programs provide an opportunity to identify environmental stressors and modify the reaction, or failing that, release the dog from the program to a companion home.

Training Days
Whereas a seizure-alert dog is like an analyst who predicts a problem to reduce its impact, a guide dog is more like an air traffic controller who bears responsibility for the team’s safety as it moves from one place to another. The dog monitors the “air space” and gives feedback to the handler, who is the pilot. Errors can be life-threatening and near-misses can lead to early burnout. The cornerstone of the training work is to, through repetition and praise, teach the dog to learn to judge a barrier or dangerous situation—for instance, the speed and distance of moving vehicles—and if need be, to respectfully disobey the human partner’s command, an act known as “selective disobedience.” The handler not only directs the dog but also supports his decisions, even when he disobeys.

As a handler explains, “Because we can’t see, we don’t know the particulars of what we’re commanding our dogs to do. The dog has to stand up to us, to get it through to us that something is there that we don’t know about, then find a way to get us out of a dangerous situation. A dog that isn’t comfortable holding his ground isn’t suited to the job.”

Guide dogs have to be able to generalize to new, complicated and sometimes abstract situations. It’s easy to train a dog to take someone to a chair. Training a dog to take a person to a place where no one else is sitting, whether it’s a college classroom or restaurant, is a more abstract concept.

Training cycles vary slightly, but generally, puppy raisers return 15-month-old dogs to the school, where they begin 18 to 20 weeks of formal training in the technical aspects of guide work. Using affection and positive reinforcement, the instructor trains the dog to respond to about 35 different commands such as forward, right, left, and find the door.

Weeks one through nine include obedience training, directional turns, negotiating obstacles, light city work, and street crossings. During week 10, dogs are introduced to traffic training. This is the point at which instructors determine whether or not the dog has the confidence and initiative to make the independent decisions needed to override many of the commands he’s learned in the previous nine weeks of training.

To traffic-train a dog, instructors capitalize on what comes naturally: Dogs will move away from an oncoming vehicle. By instinct, the dog will attempt to escape by running around, backing away from or bolting in front of the car. The trick is to control the dog’s movement with reinforcement, encouraging him to back up into the rigid harness handle even though he’s been instructed to go “forward.”

The dog doesn’t know he is signaling (indicating that it’s unsafe to go forward) but he “gets it” soon enough. The light bulb moment—when the dog realizes he is responsible for the person at the other end of the handle—is a deal-breaker for some dogs. They understand the dynamic of the partnership, but they don’t want to do it. It’s a moment puppy raisers anxiously await with mixed feelings. They want their dog to make it through training, but if he fails, they have an opportunity to keep him as a pet. Dogs who don’t want the responsibility go home to be companions. Dogs who meet the challenge move on to learning how to negotiate buildings, busy city traffic, larger street crossings, longer routes, escalators and elevator work.

After the dog is trained, the instructors teach students how to work with the dog during a four-week in-residence class. Person and dog work as a team, each contributing to a relationship built on trust that begins during class and deepens and broadens over time. Handlers are given surprising reminders of the trust they must have in their dogs, and those reminders usually show up the first time they override their dog’s decision to disregard a command. Tripping over a garden hose is minor compared to the consequences of stepping off a curb in front of an SUV making an illegal turn, but the lesson is the same.

Guide dog handler Sheila Styron, past president of Guide Dog Users, Inc., the largest organization of dog handlers in the world, explained what it’s like from the other end of the harness handle. “If a handler sits at a desk all day, his or her guide dog needs to be able to lie quietly for hours, and then be able to confidently guide the blind handler on to a noisy, crowded subway. It’s important to consider the wide array of other factors and interactions within the relationship between dog and handler that can contribute to the team’s success, difficulties or failure. The dance is extremely complex, and the magic extraordinary when all the elements fall into place.”

In the dog-training world, “crossing over” refers to switching from using old-school traditional training methods (catching the dog making a mistake and correcting that mistake) to modern positive- reinforcement methods (catching the dog doing something right and rewarding those good choices).

Quietly and without fanfare, Guide Dogs for the Blind (GDB)—an organization with a rich history and proven track record of training safe and effective guide dogs—began the process of crossing over almost a decade ago. The results have been nothing short of astounding.

According to Michele Pouliot, GDB’s director of research and development, Karen Pryor Academy faculty member, international Freestyle champion and the force behind the switch, success rates have soared. Using traditional methods, roughly 45 to 50 percent of the dogs entering the formal training process made guide dog status. With the incorporation of clicker training (one type of positive reinforcement), 60 to 85 percent graduate and are successfully paired with a blind partner.

The transition officially began within the training department in 2006. Then, in 2013, GDB adopted an organizationwide mission of maximizing the use of positive reinforcement in all departments. Their current goal is to roll out the changes over a five-year period. All of the dogs in GDB programs— the dogs in formal training, of course, but also the breeding dogs, the smallest puppies and even career-change dogs— will benefit from the commitment to clicker training. For those in the formal training program, the advantages are already clear.

“The dogs are more enthusiastic, better thinkers and problem solvers,” says Pouliot. “Their attitude is over the top. They are confident of the job. They want to do it—they can’t wait to do it!” Pouliot says that dogs who are not part of formal training, such as the breeding dogs, will also gain from the transition. For example, rather than being wrestled on and off exam tables, breeding dogs will be taught to happily get on and off by themselves. This will eliminate some of the stress experienced by both dogs and veterinary staff.

People will also be affected by the switch to clicker-training protocols. Puppy-raising families, volunteers and the blind partners with whom the dogs are paired will all be learning the power of positive reinforcement training. As they are exposed to positive reinforcement, they will learn to notice and acknowledge what the dogs are doing right, rather than looking for mistakes. Those of us who have experienced this transition know that it has the potential to be life altering.

Karen Pryor, CEO of Karen Pryor Clicker Training, author of Don’t Shoot the Dog and the person largely credited with bringing clicker methods to dog training, is equally excited by how positive reinforcement training affects people. Pryor says that learning to train this way is rewarding, and the training itself can be a powerful experience.

As an example, Pryor says she watched a blind handler learn to teach his dog to find things like the mailbox and a signal- crossing button. “What was really amazing was watching this well-dressed man and the expression on his face when he got to reward his dog. He was empowered in this process, too.”

Pouliot says that the impact of clicker training on the dogs has been more than she originally expected. “We hoped we’d get the same performance, but a happier dog. What we didn’t expect was how much better the performance would be.”

One of the initial challenges Pouliot faced was teaching the dogs to ignore food in the environment. Trainers were concerned that using food in training might make it more difficult for the dogs to learn to leave other food alone—a fair concern, to be sure. What they discovered, however, was just the opposite. Clicker-trained dogs were much more successful at this than dogs trained with traditional techniques.

Part of what worked was having a specific food-delivery protocol—a list of food do’s and don’ts that helped make it clear for the dogs. For example, the dogs are not rewarded on the ground, only by the person handling the dog and only when the dog stands in a specific position. Pouliot says that consistency with the protocol is important to a dog’s success.

Like many monumental changes, GDB’s crossing over had humble beginnings. “I started with Guide Dogs for the Blind in 1974,” says Pouliot. “I grew up with them, learning traditional training techniques: waiting for the dog to do something wrong, correcting it and then praising for the right response.” She was entrenched in traditional training, as was the rest of the organization.

For Pouliot, the change began in 2000 when she explored clicker training with her own dogs and horses. Pouliot says that when she clicker-trained her horses—not just one, but all of them—to retrieve objects from across a field, she knew she was on to something very powerful. “That was my big ‘a-ha’ moment. I was so impressed with the success.”

Inspired, Pouliot went to work trying out clicker training with the guide dog program in mind. She conducted a few unofficial trials, training dogs who had already been dropped from the program for various reasons. One, a young female yellow Lab, was too afraid of other dogs to be successful as a guide dog. Pouliot began clicker training her with the primary goal of reducing her fear. Not only was Pouliot successful in turning around the dog’s fearful response—the young Lab went from being scared to actively engaging with the other dogs—but also, the Lab was able to finish training and go on to be a career guide dog.

This and other equally exciting results encouraged Pouliot and others at GDB to begin an official pilot program. Pouliot and one of the training supervisors, Lori Brown, would formally train two dogs using clicker techniques. Because she had previously worked with dolphins (where positive reinforcement training is the norm), Brown was a natural choice for the pilot program.

The other trainers chose the dogs who would take part in the program; their candidates were considered difficult to work with, which set a very high bar for success. But after just one week, the transition in attitude alone spoke in favor of clicker training. The dogs had switched from being low energy and lacking enthusiasm to being animated and excited.

Following the initial success of the pilot program, Pouliot and her colleagues began working on specific procedures and techniques. By 2006, GDB was educating all 65 trainers on two campuses in this “new” method.

“The transition wasn’t instant,” says Pouliot. “In fact, it has been a long journey.” Because they couldn’t stop the training program long enough to establish the new routines and teach all the staff at once, progress was incremental. “We had to teach the staff in small chunks. Each year, we would add new pieces.”

Pouliot acknowledges that it was a challenge at times. Consider trainers—good trainers with 20 or more years of experience— being asked to learn and embrace new methods. But once they saw for themselves how powerful the method was, everyone got excited, and the transition moved forward at a steady pace.

Guide Dogs for the Blind’s organization-wide crossover to clicker training has and will continue to have a tremendous and powerful effect on the people and animals associated with its programs. But the reach of this transition has already been felt far beyond the immediate scope of the organization. Pouliot and GDB have shared the success of their program with guide-dog trainers worldwide through a series of weeklong seminars.

Pryor says that what GDB and Pouliot have done is not just develop a model for training guide- and other service dogs, but also showed how to reach people and organizations entrenched in traditions, and how to help them successfully make changes.

She also points out that the success of this program and the lessons learned about working in a positive manner for positive changes have had a big influence on her own life, giving her better tools to help with organizational transitions.

The magnitude of change brought about by the use of principles of positive reinforcement will continue to ripple outward to the larger guide dog world, the even larger service-dog-training world and beyond. How far? Imagine the power when a family-dog trainer can say to a doubting client, “These are similar to the methods used by Guide Dogs for the Blind. Let’s give them a try and see if they might work for your dog, too.”

Special thanks to Michele Pouliot and Karen Pryor for their contributions to this article.

The Puppy Handoff
Guide Dogs for the Blind and Karen Pryor Academy have partnered with clicker trainers on a new puppy-raising project. The kickoff took place with a ceremonial “puppy handoff” at the 2014 ClickerExpo in San Diego. According to Michele Pouliot, this joint project will help GDB explore various protocols for puppy raising using clicker techniques. The project’s puppy raisers, all experienced clicker trainers and Karen Pryor Academy Certified Training Partners (KPA CTP), have a list of things the puppies need to know by the time they enter the formal training program at 14 months. The puppy raisers are free to use their own creativity in reaching the goals. The only thing they’re required to do is film the training sessions. Pouliot and others will then review the techniques employed by these trainers to learn more about developing the most effective puppy-raising protocols for future guide dogs.