ESA, Emotional Support Animals
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subcategory of assistive animals - see http://www.drcnh.org/emotsupportweb.pdf and http://www.bazelon.org/issues/housing/infosheets/fhinfosheet6.htm for more information on the right to have emotional support animals.Assistive animals are protected by special legal status as helper animals for people with physical and/or emotional disabilities. (Both emotional and physical disabilities are defined in federal disability law. Get publicly available legal information here.
Types of Assistive Animals (legally NOT pets).
1) Emotional support animals for assisting people who have mental health/emotional disabilities or who have emotional components to serious physical conditions. For instance, a study by the World Health Organization found that people who had arthritis, diabetes, angina, or asthma were more likely to suffer from depression than people without these conditions. These animals do not need specialized training to help with specific emotional conditions. Dogs should have general obedience training, though. Animals do NOT need to learn how to do the things they instinctively do to help calm people down, and reduce stress, anxiety and depression. Little things like petting a companion animal, watching animals at play, having an animal nuzzle up to you are all therapeutic. Click here to read more about the right to have Emotional Support Animals. Please note that disability law covers BOTH physical and mental/emotional disabilities.
2) Service animals for assisting people with physical disabilities, however, must be trained to help with specific disabilities, such as dogs for the blind or deaf, in additional to obedience training. This mainly applies to dogs, but even cats have been trained, eg., to press a button in an emergency.
3) Therapy pets for assisting people in the field. There are formal programs where animals are trained to work with strangers and in unfamiliar settings. The training helps ensure that that the animals behave appropriately when out in public at schools, nursing homes, hospitals, etc. (Some religious organizations and other groups arrange for members to bring their own household pets to institutions for similar therapeutic results.)
The Therapeutic Effects of Emotional Support Animals
Read about Lucky to learn just how devoted pets can be to their guardians, especially if their care-takers are ill.