Service Dog School of America

Our goal is to educate people about animals and help pet owners provide to the best care for their beloved pets. This article is about how to make your dog a service dog. A lot of people ask, “I’m out, people see me and they come up and they’re like I want to make my dog a service dog online.” A lot of people want to make my dog a service dog, but none of them really seem to know how to go about it.

This article is also about service dogs, not emotional support dogs or therapy dogs. If you guys don’t know the difference between a service dog and emotional support dog and a therapy dog, then please go ahead and Google it.

This video is to tell you all about what a service dog is and what emotional support dogs are and therapy dogs, and the differences between all of those assistance animals.

Have you ever seen someone take their dog everywhere and you’re wondering how can I do that?  The very first thing is to understand why a person is able to take their dog everywhere with them, able to enter any public place with a service dog is covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Americans with Disability (ADA) states that the definition of a service dog is a dog that has been trained to perform tasks for somebody who has a disability. The ADA recognizes only dogs and miniature horses as service animals. For anyone interested in getting a service parrot, a service pig, a service lizard, any animal that is not actually not covered under the ADA.

It is impossible to have a service animal that is not either a miniature horse or a dog. Now that you know the definition of a service dog, let’s move into what this means.  In order to qualify for a service dog you must be diagnosed with a disability by a doctor.

Some people may be thinking, “I’ve seen service dogs out in public with their handler, and their handler seemed perfectly fine, normal.  A lot of disabilities are invisible disabilities. Use of a service dog is obvious for some disabilities like people who are blind or people in a wheelchair. Many disabilities are actually not able to be seen, diabetes, epilepsy and psychiatric disorders are just some of the invisible disabilities that people live with. Remember, in order to have a service dog, you must have a disability.  You may be thinking, “Well I must be able to have a service dog.” Self-diagnosis does not work when it comes to federal laws. You need to have the medical records in order to back yourself up. If you do want to use a service dog, you need to go to your doctor and get diagnosed, and also find out what your other treatment options may be.

If you have your diagnosis from your doctor, you’ve talked to your doctor, and you have their support to use a service dog, at this point, most people start looking for an agency to get a service dog from that can perform tasks to help you with your disability.

remember the ABA states that a service dog is a dog that has been trained to perform tasks for a person with disability so the fact that you have a disability doesn’t make you a dog a service dog not yet the reason that people use a service dog is to make their overall quality of life better so service dogs aren’t just there to make you feel better they’re there to do a job so let’s say that your diagnosis is fibromyalgia and you have trouble walking and your dog is a cocker spaniel what you will need is a mobility support dog and a cocker spaniel is just way too small for this so your dog won’t be able to be a service dog because it just isn’t capable of performing what you need it to do but if your diagnosis is something like diabetes you need a medical alert dog so size doesn’t matter and a cocker spaniel could do this if it could be trained to alert tooth drops and increases in blood sugar service dogs come in all shapes and sizes so it really depends on what your disability is and what you are expecting of your dog but on an important note it is illegal to have a service dog in a shopping cart okay so now you have your medical records and your dog is the appropriate size to perform the tasks that you need the next question is is your dog healthy enough to be a service animal for this you should get a veterinarians advise they can check to see if your dog has any signs of hip dysplasia or anything else that would hinder it from being able to perform its job remember that for dogs being a working dog is tiring and you want to make sure that your dog is in the best of health in order to perform their job and make sure that they can do it without any complications and you also don’t want your dog’s health to deteriorate by using them as a service animal okay so you have your medical records your dog is the right size to perform the duties and your dog is healthy so what’s next does your dog have the temperament to be a service animal dogs are wonderful animals and every dog owner out there believes that their dog is the best dog in the world and they’re not wrong but not every dog out there has what it takes to be a service dog we expect so much from service dogs and it’s not easy for them while working a service doggies feel to ignore everything around them except for their handler does your dog bark and squirrels do they get really excited when they see another dog do they beg for food from you every time that you’re eating do they want to greet people that they see do they want to jump up on people or other things do they pull a lot on their leash when you’re out walking all of these things are things that would disqualify a dog from being a service out your dog’s obedience needs to be 100% in order to consider using him as a service dog the truth is is that we spoil our dogs and we express our love by being lenient with that most service dogs from agencies are trained from birth of how to react and how to behave and how to ignore distractions around them so not every dog can be a service dog a service dogs worst day is still better than a pet dogs best day and your access rights are granted based on your dog’s behavior so don’t think that somebody with a service dog can go into a public place with their service dog no matter what if the dog misbehaves the management has every legal right to ask them to leave a handler and their service dog represent the entire service dog community when they’re out in public so please only consider your dog if you have an exceptional dog don’t give the rest of us a bad reputation okay so you have your medical record your dog is the appropriate size your dog is in great health and your dog has excellent behavior at this point you are certain that your dog has what it takes to be a service dog after all of this you can now start to get your dog trained to be a service animal while most of us can manage potty training and some basic obedience anything outside of this is usually beyond most people’s experience and knowledge some very experienced people can train their own service dog however most people should consult with a professional dog trainer and I’m not talking about the dog trainers at the pet stores they usually don’t have the knowledge that it takes to task train a service dog start looking up dog trainers in your area and see if there’s any the train service dogs remember the service dog community is relying on you to have a very well trained service dog service dogs are classified as medical equipment and using a fake service dog is a federal offense falsely claiming that pet is a service animal is punishable by federal fines and jail time if you liked this video please give it a thumbs up to help my channel and if you haven’t done so already please subscribe you can also follow me on Instagram and Facebook and read my blog at MJ happy tales calm thanks for joining me