A seizure alert dog alerts from 20 to 10 minutes before the onset of a seizure, but most alert 20 minutes before. The best guess is that they detect a scent of the chemical change that precedes a seizure, but no one knows for sure. Since it isn't known, a dog can't be trained to alert, but only trained to give more emphatic alerts, or to change to a different signal for the alert.

There is no tic or other physical change that precedes a seizure by 20, or even 5 minutes. In fact, seizures aren't preceded by any facial tics or other physical signs, so anyone who claims they can train a dog to detect seizures by cueing into these things is either ignorant or lying. Perhaps they are training the dogs to detect some other condition that the uninformed might mistake for seizures.

What training facility it is makes no difference. There are legal definitions that are the same throughout the United States, not based on individual trainers or programs methods.

Seizure alert is not by definition a service dog task under the new ADA laws that just were passed this year. A service dog task is defined as:
A trained task that mitigates a persons disability. (Since seizure alert cannot at this time be trained, it isn't allowed as a service dog task.)
A disibility under the law is:
A condition that prevents or impairs a persons ability to perform one or more activities of daily living. These include, but are not limited to; breathing, eating, thinking, seeing, hearing and walking.

So under the definitions, epilepsy IS a disability, but seizure alert is not a trained task. There are two requirements.
1) You must be disabled under the law. A doctor letter does not suffice.
2) The dog must do a trained task that mitigates your disability. It must both be trained; and it must directly mitigate your disability.

For example: unless you are either visually impaired, or suffer from a condition that makes you unaware of your visual surroundings; then a guide dog can't be deemed a service dog for you.

There are also seizure rasponse dogs. They respond to your seizure, not alert to it. Their response can be trained.

 Quote: joy van veen

... The best guess is that they detect a scent of the chemical change that precedes a seizure, but no one knows for sure. Since it isn't known, a dog can't be trained to alert, but only trained to give more emphatic alerts, or to change to a different signal for the alert.

Right.

 Quote: connie sutherland

... the fact that the dog does alert to impending seizures is just there -- you take what you can get, and it's always a motley crew of dogs who happen to offer this service. ...

My end is basic obedience training, but far as I know, that's correct.

I didn't know that the designation of Service Dog was not applicable to seizure-alert dogs, but under that "training" criteria, it makes sense. I teach Basic Ob, and Basic Ob was what the dogs I am talking about needed.


One of the most interesting parts of these dogs to me is that there seems to be no commonality whatsoever. No sameness of breed or size or sex or temperament or level of training or anything else I could ever see.

I'd love to know whether most dogs are aware of impending seizures and only a very few choose to let someone know about it, or whether it's something that only a very few dogs are able to do.

 Quote: Joy van Veen

There is no tic or other physical change that precedes a seizure by 20, or even 5 minutes.

There is a ton a variability in seizures, types, and causes. Some do have tics and other involuntary activity, some do not even in the same category of seizure types. For my brother his normal seizure progression is feeling slightly sick, an involuntary left abdominal tic, involuntary swallowing and finally a complex partial seizure of varying time periods normally under 3 minutes. His epilepsy is trauma induced from a military incident.

 Quote: Connie Sutherland

I'd love to know whether most dogs are aware of impending seizures and only a very few choose to let someone know about it, or whether it's something that only a very few dogs are able to do.

It's a great question I think. The only commonality I have seemed to noticed in the stories concerning alert dogs is owner interest. The problem I think in testing this issue besides the morality of control testing recurring seizure patients is that it would be difficult to find people with similar enough seizure patterns for a test.

When we were first researching alert dogs for my brother when his seizures were pretty frequent it became clear that we could try dozens of dogs and never find one that would work with him or that we might find one that would work but would be unsuitable otherwise for outside the home. Happily he got his epilepsy under control prior to his release from the army so we never got to try out an actual program.

Here is a site that tells more about both seizure aklert and seizure response dogs. It is from Paws with a Cause, a well respected service dog program.

In my opinion, any trainer who claims they can train you a seizure alert dog, is probably a scam artist. Though some people with seizures experience physical signs just before the seizure, these are not several minutes before, and may actually be part of the seizure.

Now claims of training seizure response dogs, is a whole other matter. This can be done and is a trained task!

http://www.efmn.org/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC={9E2F686E-F7F5-4D6F-B132-588A920D687E}

 Quote: Joy van Veen

... In my opinion, any trainer who claims they can train you a seizure alert dog, is probably a scam artist.

 Quote: Connie Sutherland

... you take what you can get, and it's always a motley crew of dogs who happen to offer this service. ...

The training I/we are presented with is just the most basic of basic ob, since the dogs, again, are a generally scruffy group of varying ages and breeds and levels of basic ob. Sometimes there is a need to modify the form of alert, but basic ob and everything that comes with a CGC are, so far, the immediate challenges.

I don't think I follow you Connie. Are you saying you train Seizure alert or seizure response dogs? And that you focus on ob and CGC?

I think I missed something!

Mostly only the hearing dog programs use rescue dogs. Most of the SD programs with long standing good reputations prefer to either have their own breeding program, or get the dogs from breeders with known track records. For at least some degree of health and temperament assurance. The dogs will be expected to work for approximately 10 yrs, and cost as much as $35,000 to train for SDs(service dogs), and $50,000 for GDs(guide dogs). Why take a chance with more unknown vaiables than you have to when you've invested that kind of money and about 2 yrs of training.

I didn't realize how unclear I was. Sorry.

I don't know if they are rescues. They are/were already owned, already alerting to seizures, whatever breed or sex or level of training, with owners who had no idea how to give basic ob training (CGC work).

I was and will be again, I assume, asked to do basic-ob training.

So far, the dogs have had no commonality as far as I could see, so I described them as motley. I didn't mention rescues (I really don't know; some may be) or training them to alert (as mentioned several times, I believe, although I am no expert, that you accept the dog who already does it).

 Quote: Joy van Veen

... Mostly only the hearing dog programs use rescue dogs. Most of the SD programs with long standing good reputations prefer to either have their own breeding program, or get the dogs from breeders with known track records. For at least some degree of health and temperament assurance. The dogs will be expected to work for approximately 10 yrs, and cost as much as $35,000 to train for SDs(service dogs), and $50,000 for GDs(guide dogs). Why take a chance with more unknown vaiables than you have to when you've invested that kind of money and about 2 yrs of training.

The thread was about seizure-alert dogs , but anyway, I just train lots of basic ob in a smallish city and am asked to give some no-charge help sometimes with occasionally-interesting or -unusual situations, and I thought that seizure-alert dogs were that. My understanding is that there are few established orgs that work with seizure alert dogs (and now from reading your post, I guess that it's because alerting to seizures isn't a legal Service Dog service).

" Most of the SD programs with long standing good reputations prefer to either have their own breeding program, or get the dogs from breeders with known track records." (Joy)

But what do seizure assist orgs do? I thought (but certainly could be completely wrong) that orgs like Canine Seizure Assist in NC trained dogs from lots of sources, like shelters and homes where the dog was already alerting, and trained them obedience as well as to do additional tasks like staying with the human during the seizure or maybe a modified alert. What would a breeding program do for a program that works with dogs who have shown the alerting ability?

They don't say that they train the dog to alert. They say that they train the dog who does alert to be more useful, unless I completely misunderstand. And I certainly may.

I think that very few of the Service Dog orgs work with seizure alert dogs at all.

I am interested in the larger picture. I don't understand where breeding programs fit in. (Or maybe you are saying that they don't fit in, since seizure alert dogs are not Service Dogs.)

 Quote: connie sutherland

" Most of the SD programs with long standing good reputations prefer to either have their own breeding program, or get the dogs from breeders with known track records." (Joy)

But what do seizure assist orgs do? I thought (but certainly could be completely wrong) that orgs like Canine Seizure Assist in NC trained dogs from lots of sources, like shelters and homes where the dog was already alerting, and trained them obedience as well as to do additional tasks like staying with the human during the seizure or maybe a modified alert.

I'm not familiar with that particular program. Most SD programs train many SDs for many possible tasks. Not specialize in training just for one disability, except GD (guide dog) programs. So the same program will train dogs for people with Parkinson's and MS, Epilepsy and CP. Look at CCI (Canine Companions for Independence). Even many GD programs have branched out to training GDs for those without visual impairments, but with spatial awareness problems, and for some who need both a guide dog and service dog. The dog is trained for guiding first, as there are less dogs capable of that then such common SD tasks like mobility assistance, then passed on to a service dog trainer. There are programs that work with people's own pet dogs to become service dogs, but their success rates are often very low; or they are certifying dogs that don't meet the Public Access requirements. Public Access requirements are considerably higher than those for passing a CGC.

 Quote: connie sutherland

What would a breeding program do for a program that works with dogs who have shown the alerting ability?

Seizure alerting seems to run in bloodlines. So you can breed for a higher percentage of alert dogs. Dogs that are very people oriented, and with a strong desire to help; are common characteristics of seizure alert dogs. But SD programs which breed dogs for multiple SD purposes, also look for similar characteristics for other types of SDs. Paws With a Cause used to get most of their dogs from shelters. Now they rely mainly on dogs out of their breeding program. Their success rates for shelter dogs are documented as:
>6% pass initial temperament tests.
>Out of those taken, 25% pass health screening. (Which costs them both in paying for the screening and care for the dogs.)
>Out of those, 1 in 8 complete the training and pass final temperament and task training.
In both time, money , and space; how much has been wasted? Plus they have to find homes for the dogs who fail.
Their breeding program produces a 75% success rate. The Seeing Eye's breeding program produces well over a 90% success rate, and most failures are for health reasons.

 Quote: connie sutherland

They don't say that they train the dog to alert. They say that they train the dog who does alert to be more useful, unless I completely misunderstand. And I certainly may.

Good. Then they are training seizure response. To be a task, the response must mitigate the effects of the person's seizure results. Such as lying on them to prevent them getting hurt while seizing, or turning them to facilitate breathing after seizing. But to be a service dog for public use, the dog must also pass the Public Access test. This is for all SDs, including guide dogs and hearing dogs.

 Quote: connie sutherland

I think that very few of the Service Dog orgs work with seizure alert dogs at all.

True. At least not by promising to provide one. But if a dog demonstrates that talent, programs like Paws will try to match them with someone who has seizures.

 Quote: connie sutherland

I am interested in the larger picture. I don't understand where breeding programs fit in. (Or maybe you are saying that they don't fit in, since seizure alert dogs are not Service Dogs.)

Seizure alert dogs can easily be trained to also provide a seizure response task, so they would then qualify as SDs. This is what is commonly done. It would be a waste to not employ a seizure alert dog due to not training a simple task to go along with the alert.

"Seizure alerting seems to run in bloodlines. So you can breed for a higher percentage of alert dogs."


This is interesting. My own experience is pretty small, but I haven't even seen a predominant breed. Is there one?

I had no idea at all that seizure alerting ran in bloodlines!