Personality Goes A Long Way @ Beverley’s Guide Dogs

From birth to retirement, it costs almost £50,000 to cover the costs of a working guide dog.

There are, therefore, a rigorous and exhausting set of procedures national charity – who have their regional office in Beverley – must undertake before they can place one of their dogs with a suitable owner.

But no matter how many boxes are ticked or preparatory work is done, one factor over-rides all others. Personality goes a LONG way.

“We do have standards for dogs but they are living creatures,” says Alison Booth, at Guide Dogs, based on Annie Reed Road, Beverley.

“There are standards set, but they are quite robotic really because they say a dog has to be able to do a list of certain things. They may only get seven out of 10, but they can still be a good guide dog for the right person.

“And this is where the skill lies, matching the right dog to the right person. They might have certain priorities they need in a dog, or they may be able to cope with a dog that scavenges.

“Each dog has a real individual character. I have a list of names on the wall and I try to think of who to match with a particular dog.

“People walk at certain speeds or have children or other needs. It is a bit like a dating agency, although that is a basic way of putting it.

“We always as a team want a client to be as heavily involved as possible.”

The whole team at Annie Road is geared to matching the right dog with the right person. From the first port of call – Guide Dogs support workers – a potential client is assessed on a very personal level, first in an attempt to discover if the client needs or can handle a guide dog then in placing the right dog with the right person. The financial means of a client is not an issue.

Rigorous training is undertaken once the rehab workers have done their assessment and the right dog is found for the right person. This involves instructors like Alison impersonating the dog’s new owners for six weeks (after finding out everything there is to know about the owner), a stay in Willerby Manor of two weeks for the new owner to get used to the dog then ongoing support for the owner throughout the dog’s life.

Support worker and information officer Deborah Ainsworth deals with the initial calls and everything else that crops up in the life of the dog and the owner. She also liaises and builds networks with other organisations who may have clients of their own that can be helped by Guide Dogs.

She knows exactly what difference a guide dog can make to a visually-impaired person’s life, especially after she has learnt so much about a client.

She said: “We kind of look at it as a little family because you get engrossed, you get to meet the clients on a personal basis and get to learn that a lot of their problems aren’t just with their eyesight.

“You get to know all about their life, what’s happening with them health wise. It’s more than a job, you end up living it.

“It is life changing for people. You get some clients whose lives have been totally turned around. Some people come to us who have completely lost confidence, they won’t go out on their own, they are frightened to do anything.

“And they get a dog and it completely changes their life.”

To ensure the best quality dogs are placed with clients, Guide Dogs operates a huge breeding programme at their centre in Leamington where around 1,500 dogs a year are born.

Not all make it. Some have the wrong character, some can get jumpy, but it can take a year with one of Guide Dogs’ ‘puppy walkers’ – the people who house and do the basics or training with the dogs – for this to become apparent.

It is then on to one of the four regional training centres, where the real hard work for the dog begins, before regional offices like Beverley and instructors like Alison get the dogs, start training them and look to place them with specific clients.

Alison continued: “It then takes about a year for the partnership to settle down and even then we have people who have had dogs before who have forgotten the basics of developing their own style. They still call their dogs by their old names.

“It is often harder for people who have had dogs before than those who have never had one, because it is like learning how to do things again. It’s a bit like learning to drive a new car again.”

With it being such an involved process in preparing a dog for a client, Deborah is keen to stress that while everyone who applies is treated on an individual basis, owning a guide dog is just not right for certain people.

She continued: “What you have to remember is that a guide dog is not for everyone. It is a big responsibility, it needs looking after and grooming. It is not a machine and so there is that to consider as well.

“Everyone’s vision is different. Some people may not have a lot of vision at all but still get out and about and do their own thing on a daily basis.

“But for those who do get a dog, the response we get from them is brilliant.

“The over-riding sentiment is that people say they have got their life back. And that is great for us when that happens.”

Five facts about Guide Dogs:
It costs £48,500 from birth to retirement of a guide dog
Every year more than 1,000 guide dog puppies are born
There are currently about 4,500 guide dog ‘partnerships’ in the UK
There are 380,000 registered blind and partially-sighted people in the UK. An estimated two million have a visual impairment
Guide Dogs employ 1,200 members of staff throughout the UK

The Guide Dogs team: Eddy McCabe – District Team Manager; Alison Booth – Guide Dog Mobility Instructor; Richard Madsen – Guide Dog Mobility Instructor; Richard Whomsley – Trainee Guide Dog Mobility Instructor; Jane McCabe – Trainee Guide Dog Mobility Instructor; Nicola Wood – Mobility Instructor; Rachael Allison – Mobility Instructor; Deborah Ainsworth – District Team Support Worker & Information Officer; Vicky Finney – District Team Support Worker (part time); Wendy Smith – District Team Support Worker (part time); Lisa Cuthbert – Dog Care and Welfare Advisor; Samantha Bradley – District Fundraiser

, Reed House, Annie Reed Road, Beverley, HU17 0LF. website: www.guidedogs.org.uk



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