Animal-Assisted Therapy in the Residential Treatment of Dual Pathology

Abstract

Animal-assisted therapy (AAT) is a complementary intervention of therapy that has shown positive results in the treatment of various pathologies. This study assesses the viability of the implementation and the effectiveness of an AAT program in patients diagnosed with substance abuse disorder and associated mental disorders (dual pathology). For the study, a dynamic prospective cohort was used, consisting of 43 patients in residential treatment. The program consisted of 10 sessions with a duration of about 60 min, where data was collected in the 3rd, 6th and 10th sessions. The Life Skills Profile questionnaire (LSP) and the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS-11) were used for subsequent evaluation. Patients who participated in the program showed an improvement in daily skills, which favoured a better quality of life and decreased impulsiveness, enabling them to regain self-control. These results suggest that the dog can be a multi-sensory stimulus that captures attention, and improves motivation, cooperation and patient involvement in therapy. It was concluded that AAT can serve as an adjunctive therapy in the rehabilitation processes of people diagnosed with dual pathology.

The Therapeutic Benefits of Hippotherapy: Occupational Therapy Perspective

“…1 Hayvan destekli terapinin tarihi ise hayvanların evcilleştirilme sürecine yani Neolitik döneme kadar uzanmaktadır. 2 Mağara resimlerinden elde edilen pek çok çizimde insan ve hayvan figürlerinin bir arada bulunması, yazılı tarih öncesi dönemden bu zamana kadar insanların hayvanlarla etkileşim içinde olduğunun önemli bir kanıtıdır. Eski uygarlıklardan Mısır'da öldükten sonra tekrar birlikte olabileceklerini düşündükleri için ölen kişi ile hayvanların birlikte gömüldüğü ve bu hayvanların resimlerinin mezar taşlarına çizildiği görülmektedir.…”

Human-Animal Interaction in Animal-Assisted Interventions (AAI)s: Zoonosis Risks, Benefits, and Future Directions—A One Health Approach

“…In addition, AAIs involve animal-assisted activities (AAA) and AAI resident animals (RA) [1,2], as well as nonformal interventions performed on a voluntary basis by the multidisciplinary team with motivational, educational, or recreational goals [1]. AATs contribute to improving the health and welfare of the patients [3] and can play an adjuvant role during emotional-affective, social, linguistic, and cognitive rehabilitation [4][5][6][7]. Therefore, several scientific studies, mainly concerning dog-assisted therapy, led researchers to highlight the substantial beneficial effects induced in patients affected by depression/anxiety and/or psychophysical disorders, such as adults with autism spectrum [8], or Alzheimer's diseases and other forms of dementia [6,9,10], or during psychotherapy sessions for adolescents [11], and in post-traumatic stress disorders in adults, adolescents, children, and soldiers [11][12][13][14].…”

The Efficacy of Animal-Assisted Therapy in Patients with Dual Diagnosis: Schizophrenia and Addiction

“…The presence of a substance-use disorder (SUD) and another mental illness in the same patient is called dual diagnosis (DD). DD, this coexistence of a mental disorder with substance use, makes treatment difficult and challenging due to the worsening of the clinical manifestations, as well as generates a worse evolution in care for the consumption disorder, configuring a serious clinical profile that requires continuous and specific attention, with problems such as those due to more frequent relapses, more continuous psychiatric care, etc., and, according to recent studies, DD is very common in schizophrenia, with a prevalence of around 48% [ 5 , 6 ]. Patients with schizophrenia who present a DD tend to have more relapses, a poorer clinical evolution, and more difficulties in the rehabilitation process [ 7 , 8 ].…”