The UK's leading organisation for mental health assistance dogs

Welcome to Veterans With Dogs

The UK's leading organisation that trains and provides mental health assistance dogs exclusively for current and former members of the British Armed Forces

What we do

Veterans With Dogs is the first organisation in the UK to pioneer specialised assistance dogs for Veterans with mental health difficulties.

Our goal is to improve quality of life and help Veterans lead more independent lives by training assistance dogs in task-specific skills appropriate to better mental health.

Assistance Dogs for Mental Health

For current and former members of the British Armed Forces

Life changing support for Veterans

Assistance dogs have a profound effect on the every day lives of those coping with mental health challenges

Puppy Programme

Raising the future Hero dogs to help change lives

Community Dogs

Providing services and represention of the charity

How we help

We produce exceptional assistance dog partnerships for mental health through our comprehensive training programme PALS (Partner Animal Life Skills) Programme™

Veterans who qualify through our programme have partnerships that they can depend on to help them recognise earlier the increasing symptoms of their difficulties. The dogs are trained to intervene with interruptive behaviours to help their Veteran with emotional regulation, grounding, and to remain safe.

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How we work...

At VWD we use 'bond-based option learning', which means simply that the dog chooses to participate in training sessions, or indeed any interaction with their care-giver. This forms a bond of trust with the dog from the very beginning.

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How you can help

Now more than ever our Veterans need us - and we need YOU to help us help them

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News & Features

What does the science say about assistance dogs for mental health?

Research into the effectiveness of Assistance Dogs for Veterans with PTSD revealed that 82% of those partnered with an assistance dog reported a reduction in their symptoms and 40% took less medication. Animal-assisted interventions for PTSD can help reduce the alarming suicide rate among Veterans, decrease the number of hospitalisations, and lower the cost of medications and human care.

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Evidence

Evidence demonstrates improvement in anxiety, fear, depression, and loneliness with associated physiological changes following animal-assisted interventions, which has important implications for the use of such therapy with military personnel suffering from combat stress, post-traumatic stress disorder, and other trauma-related mental health conditions.

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Dogs for Mental Health

We are using evidence based research, with combined practical experience, that has included input from experts in psychology, specialists in dog behaviour and training, and from our own experience, to gain a better understanding of the ways in which partnership with an Assistance Dog can become a valuable adjunct to conventional therapy.

Our own research includes multiple measures of symptoms associated with PTSD.

Science // Research //