"Get Close, But Be Careful"

Hi guys!

Due to my schedule this week, I was unable to attend any visits. However, as I was looking through the book that was provided to us during the Pet workshop, I found a very interesting article regarding some of the misconceptions about animal disease transmission. Just to supply you all with some statistics, the CDC (Center for Disease Control) estimates that each year nearly 2 million patients in the U.S.get an infection in the hospitals. Out of those 2 million patients, 90,000 of them die as a result of their infection. So the question is...would it be safer for the patients if they were not exposed to animals during a time when patients are so susceptible to contracting a disease? The answer is no! According to Get Close, But Be Careful, "the benefits of interacting with animals far outweigh the small, easily preventable risks involved." To elaborate, Hand In Paw teams are required to meet certain criteria prior to a therapy visit, such as bathing the dog 24 hours prior to the visit, making sure the nails are cut, etc. Before they can begin any time of visit, however, they must provide a record of the dog's vaccinations. These interventions and many more are designed in order to dramatically decrease the risk of infection. As the article states, there are many transmittable diseases that people are capable of contracting from animals. However, when precautions such as the ones I described above plus more are implemented, the risk of a disease being transmitted from the animal to the patient is very small.
This article also makes the point that knowing the way in which diseases are transmitted helps in applying the prevention measures applicable to that particular disease. For example, animals may contaminate our environment IF they are "not properly cleaned up, shed hair or dander, haven't been cleaned or groomed properly, or are not well and are shedding bacteria and parasites." Hand In Paw ensures that the therapy dog is well, and of course has the proper grooming in order to prevent infection.

To sum everything up, the following is a closing quote from the article: "You are much more likely to catch something from another person than from an animal - and that shouldn't stop you from getting close to other people. Get close, but be careful!"