2019 News & Events

Unity Care Group Day Services loved having Wesley and Linda at their facility.

Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy would like to extend our sincerest Thank You to the Springfield Meijer for their generous donation of a gift card.  We used this gift card to purchase pet food which was then donated to Open Hands Free Store on Selma Rd in Springfield.

Besides offering FREE pet therapy training, Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy is all about supporting all kinds of dogs in our community from donating pet food to a food bank so people who can't afford to feed their dog don't have to give them away, to supporting working dogs in our community, like Pasha, the Tipp City K9. Stephanie Welter reached out to Tipp City Police Department to see if Pasha needed anything. It turns out they had dreamed about getting a bite suit. Instead of donating part of the money to help purchase the bite suit, Best Friends’ Officers and Board of Directors voted to buy the whole thing. Not only does this help Tipp City Police Department and Pasha, but it will help 10 local police dogs they train with all get practice with the bite suit. Previously they only had a bite sleeve to use for training.

Here is Hercules at Soin Hospital in Beavercreek, OH, with his friends in the ER. They love Hercules. 🐾

Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy went to the Love Shack event at Northridge High School on June 15th. The event was set up to help the tornado victims with some wellness information and Pet Therapy dogs. Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy made the front page of the Dayton daily news. 

On June 3rd, Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy was very successful with the tornado relief collections. The ladies at the relief location were overwhelmed and very grateful for the items we were able to bring to them. Thank you to all who donated. We had members, friends of the group, almost members, and strangers to the group but friends of the members who graciously donated to help those in need.

Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy went to Northwestern High School May 31st to visit with the attendees of the visitation for Barrett Fitzsimmons, Barrett Strong. Barrett was a third grader. You can go to Barrett Strong Facebook page to learn about this amazing young man. We visited with the mourners, which included many children.

https://www.google.com/…/no…/RmfcInbjdnX7bGipP7LwzJ/amp.html

Sunny was at the Dayton Marriott to welcome 10 bus loads (200 veterans and their escorts) of World War II, Korean and Vietnam vets from Wisconsin. The vets spent the day at the Air Force Museum. They will spend the night at the Marriott and then travel on to Washington DC.

”Just wanted to let you know our visit at Koester Pavilion in Troy was wonderful! Max and I went into a room of a lady who was non-verbal. She lit up when she saw Max!! Was reaching for him and smiling. Even the nurse said how nice it was to see her reaction to Max. He was a good boy and just soaked up the love. Just wanted to send this message cause her reaction almost brought me to tears. Was great to make her day!”

This is the joy of pet therapy.

Pictured is Tosha and Max.

On May 4th Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy went to After Prom. West Liberty - Salem High School held their After Prom event at the school. We like school, we like prom, and we like students. So we went. After Prom started at 11:30 pm. After Prom is a wonderful event to keep students involved in a fun, safe environment instead of alternative unsafe behaviors.

Best Friends is always a big hit at the Thomas Library at Wittenberg University in Springfield.  We are visiting with the students during the stressful time of finals week. 

On April 27th while the Best Friend Pet Assisted Therapy training was going on, another group of teams were at Lincoln Elementary School in Springfield to participate in the NAACP Minority Health Fair.

https://smile.amazon.com/ch/56-2603516

Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy is now registered with Amazon Smile. Please select Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy when you are doing your Amazon shopping so that Amazon will donate to our group. Thanks!

Reposting a chart showing the differences in pet therapy dogs, service dogs, and emotional support dogs. There is a difference in the rights and privileges of each. Please do not try to pass your dog off as one of the other categories of dogs when they are not one of them.

Please only allow your Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy dog wear their Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy vest when they are going out on visits as a pet therapy dog doing visits.

Pet therapy dogs do not have the same rights and privileges as a service dog.

Kida finally got to see her friends at school yesterday. She's been busy helping to care for her new human brother, Fox.

Gus Gus started his new role as an ER Therapy dog for the staff and families. He was a very good boy! Excited to go back.

One of Gus Gus and Barclay's Twitter donors to Best Friends Pet Assisted Therapy posted a picture on their Twitter page of the items sent to them by Gus Gus and Barclay and the thank you note sent to them by Best Friends for their donation to our organization. Thanks again to them for their donation.

Pups for People did good work yesterday as it is our understanding they made enough to give a 5th grader a service dog! Sunny and Elroy were on TV 2, and we heard Reggie was on Channel 22 & 45. The teams met lots of kids and adults!

Katie Berhiet and Spartan did not do a normal "visit" but they brought Spartan to help spread the word and ended up answering a lot of questions about the difference between Therapy Dogs and Service Dogs at the All American Columbus Pet Expo held in Columbus. They even handed out a few cards to those interested in learning more. They think all in all it was a good experience for everyone

On March 3, 2019 this woman invited April to join her on the couch at Soin, so April curled up in her lap. She brought a lot of joy to patients on Friday.

Every Friday Boston enjoys getting "loved on" by the students at Northwestern High School (Clark Co).

Another successful reading program this morning at Oakwood Library. Many stories were heard while the dogs received lots of attention ❤

On February 22nd Sunny, Reggie and Chloe got to go to the library!

This is at the Kettering Behavioral Medicine Center in Dayton, OH, where Sallie Luther and Elroy supported the nomination for employee of the month. Picture posted with the facility’s permission. These are all employees of Kettering Health Network. This is a facility where Sallie and Elroy visit.

Pet therapy magic at work today. Even the couple kids that started out scared of dogs were no match for 5 minutes with Hercules. They were petting him and shaking his paw by the end of it. 😁

On January 31st Cali enjoying SuperHero Day at Dayton Children's Hospital. It’s so much fun dressing up for the kids.

Visit to Heartland of Urbana on Friday, January 25, with
Sandy Stephen with Sadie
Nancy and Dan Insley with Charlie.

Tucker and Kelley Stephens made their first visit at Miami Valley Hospital North last Friday. This location is a facility which only recently started allowing pet therapy teams to visit.

Gary visited with the students at Leesburg High School helping with the reading program, coping lesson, visiting with the history class, and representing O-H-I-O. Along the way Gary got the hair on his tail braided, his new friends did some photo bombing, and hung out with his friend, Maxx.

The residents of the Butler County Juvenile Center made a sympathy card for Sarah Leonard. The kids looked forward to every visit Scarlet made to see them.

On January 11, 2019 Katie took Spartan to the Butler County Juvenile Center to visit the staff and the residents. The residents aren’t the only ones who like the visits from the dogs.

When the sudden death of a beloved classmate occurs at Wittenberg University, Best Friend’s Pet Assisted Therapy comes in to assist the university counselors to help the students with their grieving.

Nice day for an afternoon visit at Springfield Regional Medical Center in Springfield, OH, with Bear and Sue Westfall. Such a good feeling to stop and be requested to go to patients’ rooms who are missing their pups. Staff enjoys Bear’s visit just as much as patients do.

Cali is starting 2019 off doing her favorite thing: visiting the kids, families & staff at Dayton Children's Hospital.

We are sorry to have to share that Scarlet crossed the rainbow 🌈 bridge on January 2, 2019. She will be missed by many.