Contalbrigo Laura, De Santis Marta, Toson Marica, Montanaro Maria, Farina Luca, Costa Aldo, Nava Felice Alfonso
Italian National Reference Centre for Animal Assisted Interventions, Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale delle Venezie, Viale Dell'Universita 10, 35020 Legnaro (Padua), Italy.
Veterinary Service, Local Health Unit n. 6-Euganea, Via Fra' Paolo Sarpi 76, 35100 Padua, Italy.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2017 Jun 24;14(7):683. doi: 10.3390/ijerph14070683.
Drug addiction is a major care and safety challenge in prison context. Nowadays, rehabilitation and specific therapeutic programs are suggested to improve health and well-being of inmates during their detention time and to reduce substance abuse relapse after release from prison. Among these programs, several studies reported the benefits for inmates coming from animal assisted interventions. In this pilot controlled study, we investigated the efficacy of a dog assisted therapy program addressed to 22 drug addicted male inmates housed in an attenuated custody institute in Italy. The study lasted six months, the treated group (12 inmates) was involved once a week for one hour in 20 dog assisted therapy sessions, whereas the control group (10 inmates) followed the standard rehabilitation program. One week before the beginning and one week after the end of the sessions, all inmates involved were submitted to symptom checklist-90-revised and Kennedy axis V. Inmates involved in the dog assisted therapy sessions significantly improved their social skills, reducing craving, anxiety and depression symptoms compared to the control group. Despite the limitation due to the small number of inmates enrolled and to the absence of follow up, we found these results encouraging to the use of dog assisted therapy as co-therapy in drug addicted inmates rehabilitation programs, and we claim the need of more extensive study on this subject.
药物成瘾是监狱环境中的一项重大护理和安全挑战。如今，人们建议开展康复和特定治疗项目，以改善囚犯在拘留期间的健康和福祉，并减少出狱后药物滥用的复发情况。在这些项目中，多项研究报告了动物辅助干预对囚犯的益处。在这项试点对照研究中，我们调查了一项犬辅助治疗项目对意大利一所轻刑犯教养所中22名吸毒成瘾男性囚犯的疗效。该研究持续了六个月，治疗组（12名囚犯）每周参加一次为期一小时的20次犬辅助治疗课程，而对照组（10名囚犯）则遵循标准康复项目。在课程开始前一周和结束后一周，所有参与的囚犯都接受了症状自评量表-90修订版和肯尼迪轴V评估。与对照组相比，参与犬辅助治疗课程的囚犯显著提高了社交技能，减少了渴望、焦虑和抑郁症状。尽管由于纳入的囚犯数量较少且缺乏随访存在局限性，但我们发现这些结果对于在吸毒成瘾囚犯康复项目中使用犬辅助治疗作为联合治疗很有鼓舞作用，并且我们主张对此主题进行更广泛的研究。
