Bloorview Research Institute, Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, 150 Kilgour Road, Toronto, ON, M4G 1R8, Canada; Department of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Bloorview Research Institute, Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, 150 Kilgour Road, Toronto, ON, M4G 1R8, Canada.
Disabil Health J. 2021 Jul;14(3):101012. doi: 10.1016/j.dhjo.2020.101012. Epub 2020 Oct 11.
Having a service dog can help to increase independence and well-being among people with a disability or a chronic health condition. Although there has been an increasing use of service dogs among children and youth their impact has not yet been synthesized.
The purpose of this article was to conduct a systematic review assessing the impact of service dogs on children, youth and their families.
Systematic searches of seven international databases from 1985 to 2020 led to 29 studies meeting our inclusion criteria. Using a narrative synthesis review approach we analyzed these studies regarding their sample characteristics, methods, results and quality of evidence.
There were 29 studies in our review that included 1121 children and youth (or parents representing them) that spanned across six countries over a 32-year period. Although the outcomes of the impact of service dogs varied across the studies, 23/29 of them reported an improvement in at least one of the following: physical health (i.e., diabetes management, seizure management, mobility), psychological health (i.e., quality of life, safety, behavior, stress, anxiety, self-confidence and independence), social well-being (i.e., social interactions, school and work) and dog-owner-bond. Children, youth and their parents also described several challenges in owning a service dog.
Our findings highlight that service dogs have potential to provide many benefits for children, youth and their families. Further research, including more rigorously designed studies, is needed to fully understand their impact.
拥有服务犬可以帮助残疾或患有慢性疾病的人提高独立性和幸福感。尽管越来越多的儿童和青少年开始使用服务犬，但它们的影响尚未得到综合评估。
本文旨在对服务犬对儿童、青少年及其家庭的影响进行系统评价。
对 1985 年至 2020 年的七个国际数据库进行系统检索，共纳入 29 项符合纳入标准的研究。采用叙述性综合评价方法，我们对这些研究的样本特征、方法、结果和证据质量进行了分析。
我们的综述共纳入 29 项研究，涉及 1121 名儿童和青少年（或代表他们的家长），跨越六个国家，历时 32 年。尽管服务犬的影响结果在不同研究中有所不同，但 29 项研究中有 23 项报告至少在以下一个方面有所改善：身体健康（即糖尿病管理、癫痫管理、活动能力）、心理健康（即生活质量、安全性、行为、压力、焦虑、自信和独立性）、社会福祉（即社交互动、学校和工作）和犬主关系。儿童、青少年及其家长还描述了拥有服务犬的一些挑战。
我们的研究结果表明，服务犬有可能为儿童、青少年及其家庭提供许多益处。需要进一步开展包括更严格设计的研究，以充分了解其影响。
