By Faye Beard
Millie’s life has made a dramatic turnaround since she was rescued from a cycle of abuse and neglect. Now, the donkey is a co-therapist at the Barking C.A.A.T Ranch in Arvada, Colo. That would be C.A.A.T. as in the Center for Animal-Assisted Therapy, where her colleagues include Lulu the ferret, Gloria the guinea pig, and a chicken named Maya Angelou.
They assist a team of psychotherapists who counsel human patients struggling in areas such as personal growth and development, couples and marital issues, and gender and identity exploration.
Social workers, according to SAMHSA, are the No. 1 providers of therapy services.
“The strong bond between animals and humans is at the heart of two increasingly popular specialties in social work practice: veterinary social work and animal-assisted social work,” explains Kaelyn Lewis, LLMSW-Macro, Director of Membership & Communications at the NASW-Michigan chapter. “The former targets the human needs of veterinary professionals and their clients, addressing the hardships that arise from the love of animals and the toll of caring for them. The latter marshals the transformative and potentially healing power of animals to aid in the therapeutic process.”
The strong bond between animals and humans is at the heart of two increasingly popular specialties in social work practice: veterinary social work and animal-assisted social work.
This spring, the NASW-Michigan chapter will relaunch the Human-Animal Bond in Social Work Interest Group. A previous iteration of the group disbanded during COVID, Lewis says. More than 200 NASW members have already signed up for the quarterly meetings to discuss the social work profession and how animals impact their clients.
About a century ago, the father of psychoanalysis himself Sigmund Freud often invited his dog, Jofi, to keep him calm during therapy sessions. Psychology Today often references how Jofi had similar calming effects on Freud’s patients. Then, in the 1950s, child psychologist Boris Levinson observed how his dog Jingles was able to motivate a nonverbal boy to start talking. By 1964, Levinson had coined the phrase “pet therapy,” according to the National Library of Medicine.
The Human Animal Bond Research Institute, in its Pet Effect campaign, highlights the positive benefits that pet ownership has on human lives. Animal interactions are promoted to be effective in managing autism, depression, post-traumatic stress and loneliness.
“Ultimately, the goal is to create a more sustainable, compassionate world where both humans and animals thrive,” says Augusta O’Reilly, LCSW, president of the International Association of Veterinary Social Work. The organization works to improve the mental health and well-being for professionals who work with animals, reducing suicide risk and compassion fatigue. It also strives to strengthen support systems for clients facing pet loss or difficult medical decisions as well as financial hardships and limited access to veterinary care in underserved communities.
Even chickens work as co-therapists at the Center for Animal-Assisted Therapy.
In an episode of the NASW Podcast Social Work Talks, Elizabeth Strand, PhD. LCSW, discussed her journey to become the founding director of Veterinary Social Work at the University of Tennessee’s College of Veterinary Medicine. “We coined the phrase Veterinary Social Work,” Strand says of the namesake discipline that she established in 2002. The interprofessional program is often credited with being the first of its kind in the nation, but now several universities are preparing the next generation of social workers specializing in human-animal interactions.
At Virginia Tech University, the Veterinary Social Work Service pays special tribute to dearly departed pets. In addition to hosting pet funerals, its Veterinary Teaching Hospital encourages mourners to share on its virtual memorial board. One heartwarming eulogy honored a rambunctious feline born on the mean streets of Philadelphia. His obituary read: “He played professional soccer in his youth, keeping fit through a nightly regimen of bedtime sprints down the hallway.”
Dual Ivy League degrees are offered at the University of Pennsylvania with a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine and a Master of Social Work to be completed in five and a half years. Clinical cases may examine how farmers have to balance their needs with the needs of livestock. One of the animal-related field placements is Gateway HorseWorks, a suburban Philadelphia ranch featured in the award-winning documentary short film “Healing in the Open.”
Students at the University of Denver’s Graduate School of Social Work are reminded about the social worker’s mindset. “We should center social justice and equity in our language around society’s relationship with animals,” says Nina Ekholm Fry, who serves as the faculty coordinator for the graduate certificate of specialization in Human-Animal-Environment Interactions in Social Work within the MSW program.
“We have to be mindful about saying things such as we ‘use’ animals in this practice; we don’t want to emphasize a sense of exploitation,” Ekholm Fry says. “We should try phrases such as animals are incorporated or included in these practices.”
Another way to mitigate the power imbalance of the human hierarchy is to address animals by they/them pronouns when the gender is unknown instead of as an “it,” Ekholm Fry suggests. “It’s important that social worker values be present in our interactions with all animals—whether they are human beings or other species.”
