• Guest - w'd love to know what you think about the forum! Take the 2025 Survey »

diabeties help dog

sabrina

Member
Messages
6
hi i was wondering anyone on here has got a diabeties dog???? and if you do was it hard to get one?? and was wondering exactly what is involved???
 
Here is a copy of a post about this subject made previously. It should have all the details you need by clicking on the link.

Re: DIABETES HYPO ALERT DOGS
by cugila » July 30th, 2010, 8:43 pm

Hypo alert assistance dogs are placed with those who meet the application criteria. Recipients are given training in handling and caring for an assistance dog. Training assistance dogs is an expensive exercise, we rely on donations to fund this.

Here is a link to the organisation that provides the animals and, How to apply for a Hypo Alert Dog

http://www.hypoalertdogs.co.uk/apply.html

These dogs can aid diabetes management, giving their owners advanced warning of both impending hypoglycaemic and hyper episodes.
 
my oldest dog hasnt been trained but does let me know when hypo ,but only on a night :)
 
Mine too at night, one of them will get under the covers with me, which is the only times she will will attempt it....but during the day I don't think either of them are alert to my hypo's...
 
There also a couple of charities that as well as providing a trained dog will also help you train a suitable family pet dog, as this is what I'm hoping to do with Ellie my german shepherd to have her offically regconised as a alert dog..

Both my dogs can dectect hypo's in either of us, Ellie does the night shift I think as she will wake you up in the night...

But Wednesday night they proved to be absolute life savers for my husband. He had taken the dogs out for a run over the fields before tea and getting dark.

Jones came home alone, when the lady knocked on our front door saying is this your dog, he's trying to get in... My daughter and I knew something was seriously wrong, my daughter grab her mobile legged it out the door shouting I phone when I find him...

She found him up the lane collasped with Ellie by his side, she tried to find his hypo kit but alas he forgotten it.. So she called the ambulance and a lad passing dashed off to get a sugary drink then phoned me saying she's frightened... reasurance I was on my way so was the ambulance it be fine...

The paramedic was able to bring him around in the ambulance, but he had become hypothermic so needed to go to A&E to bring his body tempreture up again...

We've pieced together what happened, he felt hypo over fields, but realised he didn't have his hypo kit or his mobile so couldn't phone me so decided to head home via the lanes quickest way home and hoped he could make it.. He remembers hitting the lane when he started to struggle, so decided to crawl, he can remeber the dogs licking him and crawling a bit futher along the lane and can rembember getting near to the school, but can't remember how long it had taken him, then he remebers coming around in the ambulance...

We've worked out that OH must have crawled about 1/4 mile and probably took him around 1/2 hour or so hence the hyperthermia and the dogs had managed the best they could to get him as near to safety or should I say easier to find, before Jones came on ahead to find help and Ellie stayed to look after him while awaiting help to arrive... If the dogs hadn't done this it would have been 1/2 hour or so before I got concerned and decided to look for them, and I would have gone the long way around via the road to the fields before starting to look first in the fields before heading off down the lanes in the dark to see if I could find them..

So to us the dogs saved his life, worked out they needed to get him to somewhere he could be easily found, before Jones went ahead to fetch me... Utter heros and totally intelligent dogs indeed.
 
Thank you for telling us about this experience.

Animals are usually more sensitive to our feelings and physical needs than we may realise, but this shows how sensible and practical they can be to help us.

Really wonderful!

I hope you've all recovered from the incident,

Jane
 
Jopar - what a wonderful story. I hope your husband is alright now. And that you gave the dogs a reward. It must help to know that your dogs are capable of helping in a hypo situation.
 
Your hubby needs a man bag Jopar or one of those bumbags so he doesn't leave home without something. What about duct taping some glucose tablets to the dog leads. At least the dogs know what to do.

Very glad he is okay and three cheers for the hounds. :D
 
omg i am actually crying, what a lovely story, what fantastic dogs. I have 3 border collies and would love to try and train my puppy to recognise the signs but have no idea where to start.
 
Jen

We have a bum bag for walking, With treats, Ellie's training tug/rope, poo bags, hypo kit (well should be there) and mobile phone for some reason the latter two he forgot :shock: , and he even forgot to take his BG before setting out.. Hard lesson to learn me thinks it has now been restocked, along side verious coat pockets...

Fig

Some dogs will pick it up very naturally like my two did, but you may encourage them by selecting a very highly valued treat, and this treat is only given with a hypo, when you sense a hypo you give them one treat hopefully they will click that when they sense the hypo they will warn you, you may have to look for changes in pups behaviour to identify that they are regconising it if they do give them several pieces of the treats.. If you feel the hypo and they don't then return to one treat..

Then once they are clicking you may decide to move on with fine tuning, I've found I haven't needed to do this as their behaviour is enough to warn... Jones starts nudging you and then heads for my handbag, Ellie tends to change her behaviour during the day, but at night if she detects a night-time hypo you get the nudging of a cold wet nose, followed by pawing if you still fail to respond to this she will jump all over you (the only time she ever comes onto the bed) and 32kg's of German Shepherd bouncing on you tends to wake both of us up :roll:

And yes they have been very well rewarded, lots of hugs (my daughter gave lots of treats while we were in A&E) then on Thursday down to the petshop, new leads and they got to choose some treats...

My oldest daughter has now ordered new ID tags for them, and is having included into on the infomation that both owners are T1 diabetic, which was a suggestion made by my friend.. Which we all think is a cool idea indeed.
 
A wonderful story Jo, you're very lucky to have two very clever and caring dogs. I hope your hubby has recovered from his ordeal and is feeling better.
 
Back
Top