Hi Guys,
So one thing I have just realised is that everything so far has been from Super Dog's point of view. Time for from my Dad's (Ian) point of view. So depending on where you all are based a quick qeography lesson we live on the West Coast of Australia. All off these amazing super dogs or the ones that are trained to be able to detect seizures (medic alert / seizure response dog)and help to potentially save my sons life are trained and based on the East Coast of Australia. So it is approximately 4,000 kms one way give or take a couple of kms. So thats a 8,000 kms round trip. These dogs cost upwards of $30,000 for someone based on the East coast of Australia. It takes approximately 2 years of training for these dogs to learn how to interact with people (adults and kids) remembering this Super Dog can go anywhere and everywhere my son go by law (there is only 1 place in Australia it can not go, same for Guide Dogs). As we live on the West Coast of Australia we have to fly over or send Ben over (as if we are going to send an Epileptic child unattended on a plane haha) every couple of months to bond with the dog and then we fly back and repeat during the 2 year period. So all of this is an added cost to us unfortunately as there are no organisations in Western Australia that do Medic Alert Dogs / Seizure response dogs as there is no money it they say??
Just a couple of quick facts in Western Australia where we live we have more people suffering from Epilepsy than from blindness, motor neurone disease, muscular distrophy and MS combined scarey isnt. Not sure about where you live but when was the last time you heard about Epilepsy until you where reading this?? But Epilepsy receives hardly any funding at all.
More people die from SUDEP (sudden unxexplained death in epilepsy patients) than in house fires, now that really scares because we are always hearing off someone dieing in a house fire. What happens when I am asleep and my son has an Absent seizure, there is no device on the market anywhere in the world today that can detect this, the only thing that can is one of this highly trained dogs!!! Thats why I have done one of the hardest things I have ever done and that is put my hand up and ask for help please.
As I mentioned above the Super dog will go where ever Ben goes and will always be working. When Ben is at school it will be under his desk while he is working. If he is about to have a seizure the dog will get the attention of a teacher / adult / child that a seizure is eminent and that Ben needs help. The dog will also ensure that Ben places himself somewhere safe and if need be the dog will use its body to make sure Bens body is protected and will use its body as a buffer if need be. The dog also carries an ID photo of the itself, Ben and also carries the emergency seiure medication so it is always on hand.
The below picture is just an example of what a medic alert dog / seizure response dog looks like for anybody wondering.
If anyone has any question. Please let me know. Thanks so much. Ian
