Are Animals Beneficial

Are Animals Beneficial to our Health? When we think of therapy animals most likely one would think of the service dogs that assist disabled people with daily activities in life; however is it possible that different animals could be beneficial to someone’s health? There are more than dogs being used for therapy in helping people either with a disability or health issues. Animals play an important role in people’s lives. In addition to seeing-eye dogs and dogs that can be trained to detect seizures, animals can also be used in occupational therapy, speech therapy, or physical rehabilitation to help patients recover from various surgeries or procedures. Aside from these designated therapeutic roles, animals are also valued as companions,
These therapy animals help bring people happiness and lower their stress and help with depression which is very beneficial to a person’s overall health. In a research paper on the positive powers of pets written by Cindy C. Wilson, research director of Family Medicine at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences she reported that there were beneficial cardiac effects of animals in a sample of 92 healthy Caucasian college women in Arizona. In her study she observed that both blood pressure and heart rate escalated when the subjects were asked to read aloud in a room with the experimenter. However when the subjects were asked to read aloud again while petting a friendly dog the heart rate and blood pressure decreased instead of escalating. Ms. Wilson also compared baseline measurements of blood pressure, heart rate, and specific psychological traits for the 92 woman. She focused on the cardiac effects and she had this conclusion (page 1560) “This study confirms and extends previous