Veterans Affairs Is Off Its Leash Again The department has bungled a study to determine the efficacy of service dogs in easing post-traumatic stress disorder. By Luis Carlos Montalván
http://www.wsj.com/articles/veterans-affairs-is-off-its-leash-again-1467932644
In 2009 Congress passed the Service Dogs for Veterans Act, or SDVA, with bipartisan sponsorship as part of the National Defense Authorization Act.
SDVA included a $5 million appropriation for the Department of Veterans Affairs to conduct a comprehensive study to determine the efficacy of dogs in easing post-traumatic stress disorder among veterans.
Seven years after the Service Dogs for Veterans Act was passed, where do things stand? You may not be surprised to learn that the VA bungled its task.
“The implementation of the study,” Richard Weinmeyer wrote in the American Medical Association’s Journal of Ethics last year, “has been hampered by numerous setbacks.” Three service-dog providers were recruited, but two had dropped out by 2012, the journal reported, and “the entire project was suspended from January to June 2012 after a child was bitten by one of the study dogs.” Then the study was halted again amid the VA’s worries that a hospital in the study was endangering the dogs’ health. A revamped project was launched in 2014, but progress appears scant.
I wondered how such a well-intentioned effort could have gone so wrong for so long. For instance, how were the service-dog providers selected? I filed a Freedom of Information Act request late last year—and have yet to receive anything other than promises that information would be forthcoming. CONTINUE AT SITE
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