[nagdu] Sort of OT - Great use of COC dogs from GDB!

[Lyn Gwizdak]

Where is this Dogs 4 Diabetics?  I have a friend who has dioabetes and her 
dog woould just alert on her low sugars just on his own - no training 
besides being a guide dog.

Are they now able to actually teach tasks to a dog to alert on sugar levels 
or do they just have to wait til they fiond a dog that just does this on 
their own?  Neat isdea!

Lyn and Landon
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Dailyah Patt" <dailyahpatt at yahoo.com>
To: "NAGDU Mailing List the National Association of Guide Dog Users" 
<nagdu at nfbnet.org>
Cc: <gdui-friends at yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Monday, June 11, 2012 1:42 PM
Subject: [nagdu] Sort of OT - Great use of COC dogs from GDB!


Hi gang and apologies who get this from both lists -

I was at a Dogs 4 Diabetics event in Concord, CA yesterday and while I 
already sort of knew this, having it spelled out for me was pretty cool. D4D 
is getting most of their dogs from GDB in San Rafael! Basically, GDB will 
identify dogs that have been puppyraised and even most have had some of the 
guide training but dogs that they're going to release or COC for being too 
sniffy or too energetic...sometimes even a a very minor health problem that 
would prevent Guide work. D4D is looking for those exact kinds of dogs. They 
want dogs who are nose-based and energetic so that the dog spends a lot of 
time sniffing on their partner...which is how the dog identifies low blood 
sugar and sudden changes in sugar levels. The work is not too physically 
strenuous (like guide work can be), so very minor health things are often 
just fine. They're also taking those dogs that try to do things like guide 
around the puddle rather than walk a straight path. lol
 It's brilliant. By the time D4D gets the dogs, they've already had so much 
love, training, good breeding, etc., so D4D can usually go right to work on 
training them diabetic alert. This allows them to have a fairly quick turn 
around time from acquisition to placement. The dogs have already been 
heavily screened. These are dogs that GDB can't use anyway - just a great 
career change for some of these dogs and a wonderful partnership between two 
programs. Too cool! Great to see folks working together towards life saving 
goals! Also, when the dog eventually graduates with a diabetic, D4D holds 
graduation so GDB puppyraisers can come meet the handler of a pup they 
raised to work as a guide and then had been told the dog was being released. 
Surprise, puppyraisers! HAHA! Bait and Switch - your dog will now be 
graduating in Concord, but not as a Guide. Still awesomeness! Yeah!!!!! 
Happy, working, helpful dogs!

As a total bonus, apparently something like 30% of GDB's clients are blind 
from diabetes or have diabetes and subsequent complications, so not only are 
the two programs starting to experiment with a couple of dogs cross-training 
them, but by giving released dogs to D4D to become diabetic alert dogs GDB 
is helping diabetics BEFORE they'd possibly go blind in the first place. 
People with D4D dogs usually have about the best controlled diabetes of 
anyone diabetic. The dogs will alert to a low 10-15 minutes EARLIER than a 
glucometer will read that you're low and as a result, diabetics who used to 
cruise at higher glucose levels feel safer running on the lower end because 
they've got a trusty four-foot to let them know before they get into real 
trouble. 80-120 is normal for most humans, but type 1 diabetics can have 
numbers all over the place because they're constantly juggling carbs they've 
eaten, levels of exercise, stress and then trying to figure
 out how much insulin to take. It's tough. (One of my best friends is a type 
1 and has applied to D4D.) Anything over 200 starts to permanently damage 
the kidneys and eventually the heart and other systems, but it's "safe" in 
that they know they aren't going to run too low, slip into a coma and die in 
their sleep. Lows aren't all that damaging, but are very scary - ESPECIALLY 
when there's nobody around. In less than an hour a person can go from normal 
and fine to so incapacitated that they aren't thinking clearly enough to get 
themselves help. The dogs kind of "allow" these folks to run at the lower 
and safer numbers because they can rest assured that their dog isn't going 
to let them get TOO low and out of it.

Too cool not to share! Go D4D and go GDB!

Dailyah
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