Pets As Therapy (PAT)

Links included in this post can be found on and will direct you to the PAT website in a new tab.

Links to journal articles from various websites will be included also. Unfortunately, links to journal articles will not be open access and you will need a login to be able to read the whole article if you wish to do so. However, the abstracts should provide you will enough detail to get a general gist of aim(s) of the study, method(s), participants and results.


What is PAT?
Pet's As Therapy is a charity made up of volunteers, who through their services aim to have a positive impact on the wellbeing of those they visit. The services that they provide is very valuable to a range of people regardless of their age or any special requirements. That's of course unless you have a fear of dogs or cats!

The Benefits of Animal Therapy
We all love spending time with our beloved pets. They are something we can look forward to after a long day, they will sit there and listen to us rant on and you can trust them not to say anything to anyone else (expect maybe each other if they have a buddy to live with!), and they are too cute not to have cuddles with when you're feeling a bit low.

If you read last week's post or follow me on Instagram, you may remember coming across my own fluffy buddies. Bubbles (left) and Squeak (right) are my guinea piggies. I got them as a pressie for doing well in my GCSEs. They turned 3 this year!

The Human Animal Bond Research Institute (HABRI) and Cohen Research Group conducted a survey with 2,000 pet owners in 2016, with pet owners suggesting that owning a pet has positive benefits on their own mental health (74%) or that of a family member (75%). This survey also found that 88%  agreed that health professions should recommend getting a pet to encourage 'healthier living'.

Recently, you may have seen several news articles talking about the physical and psychological benefits of animals on humans. Researchers have found several benefits of pets and animal therapy, including:

• Releases calming hormones whilst reducing stress hormones
• Also helps to lower blood pressure as a result
• Can help to combat loneliness by providing social stimulation
• Increases use of motor coordination
• Encourages the development of social skills such as communication
• May aid in reducing the effects of negative mental health (e.g.: depression and anxiety)

Temperament Assessments
In order to become a volunteer with PAT, all dogs and cats must undergo a temperament assessment. Through testing how they may react to a range of scenarios and stimuli, it helps to ensure that they will be comfortable and suitable to cope with the environments in which they may volunteer within. This also assess the owner's ability to maintain control over their dog/cat, all of which is vital for the health and safety of volunteers and clients. These temperament assessments may be slightly more challenging for cats given their curious nature and possibly differing reactions to human contact in comparison to dogs. More can be found on the temperament assessments by clicking on the links below:

• Factsheet: PAT temperament assessment (dogs)
• Factsheet: PAT temperament assessment (cats)

Once volunteers are ready, they receive their official badges. I didn't realise this until one of the volunteers showed me, but the cats and dogs even have their own ID's attached to their collars (how cute!).

All dogs and cats must also have had certain vaccinations before volunteering and even have to be on a diet which does not consist of raw meat for further health and safety precautions. As you can tell PAT are strict on maintaining high standards of health and safety and safeguarding.

If you are interested, more information on these policies and further factsheets

can be found on the hyperlink attached.

PAT Sessions
I have been to 2 PAT sessions at Warwick, each lasting 10 minutes. The first time was in Term 1, arranged as part of the Study Happy initiative run by our library team at Warwick. I volunteered as a Wellbeing Ambassador where I helped to promote World Kindness Day during the PAT visit.

I can't remember the dog's name (oops...), but I will insert a photo of him on the left. I'm not going to lie, my memory of Term 1 and 2 is non-existent. All I remember is having a really nice conversation with the owner about something, although I have no memory of what it was about at all.

The second session I attended was in Term 3 a week before my first exam. This time it was arranged as an exam season destress activity by the Psychology Department. I thought that I would sign up to get myself out of my room since it was the first week of having no lectures and took it as a chance to be able to have a chat with someone. I had a great time hanging out with Daisy and her owner. I didn't manage to get a photo this time round but here is one of her taken by Warwick Library.

Daisy is a rescue dog, who is relatively new to the PAT team. She was found running around on a motorway somewhere in Hertfordshire. I think her owner mentioned that she was only 2 years old. Daisy was so calm and gentle.

Her owner was really friendly, and it was so lovely to be able to have a chat with someone as well. We spoke about the psychology department, first year of uni in general, volunteering and my difficulty with finding a volunteering placement for the Summer, and some more about Daisy. She told me how her and Daisy frequently visits care homes to provide the elderly some companionship. She also takes part in the Red2Dogs scheme, where she will sit to children and let them read to her. This helps children with their literacy skills and communication as reading to dogs is a lot less intimidating than reading to a human. Pet therapy has also been found to be beneficial for many SEND children who struggle with reading aloud.

If you're a Warwick student you will probably already know Ben-G. PAT volunteer Ben-G is probably the most famous PAT dog at Warwick. Along with campus cat, Rolf, he became one of the faces of Warwick's Library Study Happy campaign. We love having the PAT volunteers around!

I've never been to a PAT cat session, so in case you're not a dog person, here are some photos of cats!

They're not trained but spending time with any of your pets or favourite animals can make a good therapy session! Carmen (left) was my Aunt's cat who is now with an elderly lady in need of some companionship and Milly (right) is a neighbourhood cat who likes to sneak into our garden for some pats and cuddles! Aren't they both beautiful?

As PAT is a charity, any amount of donation can go a long way to support their services.

You can make donations through:

• Their JustGiving page on their website;
• Text message, by texting PATS01£(amount) to 70070, OR
• You can become a PAT Supporter.

Or if you have a cat or dog who may fit the role and you would like to get into some volunteering, why not consider joining the PAT team? Again, more information and their social media accounts can be located on their website.

🐟🐹🦆🐶 An animal can really be a person's best friend! 🐱🐇🐭🐸