Therapy Dog Sites

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Postby Maryellen » January 9th, 2006, 7:24 pm

For those interested in obtaining your therapy dog title and working your bullies.. these are the 3 major Therapy Dog Groups

Delta Society http://www.deltasociety.org/VolunteerAboutAbout.htm

Therapy Dogs International http://www.tdi-dog.org/

Bright and Beautiful Therapy Dogs http://www.golden-dogs.org
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Postby mnp13 » January 19th, 2006, 3:42 pm

and you can check out Ruby's site - http://www.ThisIsRuby.com for info on different groups (just a little shameless self-promotion)
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Postby mnp13 » May 24th, 2006, 3:21 pm

After my recent treatment by TDI, I no longer recommend that you certify through them.
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Postby jlewin » September 27th, 2006, 1:11 pm

what happened with TDI? sorry if you posted somwhere else and i missed it.
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Postby lellis34 » September 27th, 2006, 2:17 pm

On September 27 2006, jlewin wrote:what happened with TDI? sorry if you posted somwhere else and i missed it.


Yes, please share. I'm interested in doing therapy work with King and was looking into them.
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Postby mnp13 » September 27th, 2006, 2:35 pm

The brief version -

A complaint was made about me and Ruby by a third party who heard "from someone" that Ruby was behaving unsafely at therapy vists.

TDI contacted me and informed me that Ruby was suspended pending investigation and that I was to submit a letter if I wanted to contest the suspension.

I called them and asked who had made the complaint and what exactly the complaint was. the wouldn't tell me the person's name or even what the "charges" were.

I wrote them a letter and provided four references - all people who had seen, worked with or evaluated Ruby. In my opinion, speaking to credentialed trainers, therapy visit supervisors and people who have been with Ruby many times on visits meant more than me defending my own dog. I had to guess as to what the complaint was specifically aimed at, so I covered all of the bases that I could think of.

They responded in writing that she was removed from TDI and that she was unsuitable for therapy work.

I called and spoke to them. They didn't call a single reference. They didn't contact any of the places I had done therapy. They went on the word of someone who had never seen Ruby in a therapy situation. They said it "wasn't their policy" (direct quote) to contact references, that the owner needed to respond directly. In other words - they wanted a completley biased evaluation of the dog - what owner is going to be unbiased!!!

I do not recommend TDI to anyone after this incident. They didn't care about the truth, they just dumped us because it was easier. I would hate for someone else to put that amount of time and effort into working with their dog just to be kicked out over a spiteful person's lies.

Yes, I know who made the complaint. It was a member of my training club who had a personal issue with me. Was there a kernel of truth to the complaint? yes. However it was blown so far out of proportion that there was almost no truth left.
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Postby lellis34 » September 27th, 2006, 2:40 pm

Thanks for the info. There's a relatively new group in my area that I'm looking to get involved with and they certify through the Delta Society so I've been scouring their information as well as TDI. I'll focus on Delta for now I think.

Are you open to answering some questions about therapy work? The local group has orientation sessions and I'll be going to the next one they have, but I have loads of questions about doing this.

Thanks,
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Postby mnp13 » September 27th, 2006, 2:50 pm

Sure!

Ruby and I did work with children and the senior residents at a psyche center. so we have a decent range of experience.

I would definately go with Delta, they are a little stricter, but I haven't heard anything bad about them.

I am planning to re-certify but I will not be making my group of choice public to protect myself and Ruby.
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Postby jlewin » September 27th, 2006, 3:18 pm

wow. sorry to hear about your trouble with TDI. I have helped a few people in training to get certified with TDI, although I do not currently handle any therapy dogs myself. Think about it often but only so many hours in a day. I've been to you site on Ruby and she looks like a doll. I'm sure you'll get things back up and running in no time.
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Postby luvmyangels » September 27th, 2006, 3:35 pm

I had just gotten information from TDI. Thanks for sharing the situation you went through with them.
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Postby mnp13 » September 27th, 2006, 3:55 pm

It doesn't mean that you shouldn't use them, I just had a bad experience with them. I want people to be aware of their lack of fair procedures with complaints. If you never have a complaint against you, I'm sure you'll be fine.
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