Assistance Dog Training and Support
Our mission
To make a meaningful difference in the lives of individuals with disabilities by improving quality of life and promoting independence.
Our goal is to increase access to Assistance Dogs for individuals with disabilities through affordability, genuine support, transparency, and compliance with the Commonwealth Disability Discrimination Act 1992 Section 9 by supporting you to train your own assistance dog.
What is an Assistance Dog
An assistance dog is trained to assist their individual handler to access to all public places including, but not limited to: shopping centres, hospitals, public transport and restaurants.
According to the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) (DDA) - Section 9.2c - an assistance dog is an animal that is trained to alleviate the disability of an individual including a physical, sensory, psychiatric, intellectual, or other disability.
Assistance dogs must meet standards of hygiene and behaviour appropriate for public access.
Business and organisations that serve the public must allow people with disabilities to bring their assistance animals into all areas of the facility where customers are normally allowed to go. This Commonwealth Law applies to all businesses open to the public.
Support for Handlers
We provide assistance dog training in Brisbane and support the independent owner trainer/handler team rather than offering pre-trained dogs, we partner with you by providing the tools, education and expert support needed to successfully train your dog, with guidance from our qualified trainers.
Our program offers 2x one on one training sessions per month, task training, public access training and support, general obedience training, a theory element to ensure you are aware of your access rights (included in the public access readiness evaluation) and multiple 'check-in's' throughout the process. On completion of the program we offer public access assessments.
Assistance Dog Suitability Assessments & Requirements
Before training starts we require you and your dog to meet certain suitability requirements. The handler must have a disability as defined by the Disability Discrimination Act (1992), a medical practitioner must agree that an Assistance Dog is suitable to help you and you/your carers have the ability to maintain appropriate care and health of your assistance dog.
Disability Discrimination Act defines a disability as:
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total or partial loss of the person’s bodily or mental functions
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total or partial loss of a part of the body
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the presence in the body of organisms causing disease or illness
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the malfunction, malformation or disfigurement of a part of the person’s body
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a disorder or malfunction that results in the person learning differently from a person
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without the disorder or malfunction
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a disorder, illness or disease that affects a person’s thought processes, perception of
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reality, emotions or judgment, or that results in disturbed behaviour;
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and includes disability that:-presently exists or may exist in the future.
If you meet the above requirements, we can move onto an assistance dog suitability assessment for your dog.
The suitability test will cover the following areas:
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Overall temperament
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Energy Levels
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Negative reactions
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Quality of life
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Focus
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and more
Your Assistance Dog prospect must pass the assistance dog suitability assessment before moving through to the training stages.