Diabetic Assist Dog – ‘DAD’

by Claire, 2 years ago

My friend Stacey is blessed to be receiving the very first Diabetic Assist Dog – otherwise known as a ‘DAD’ in South Africa! Read a letter from her family here, and read how YOU can make a difference to diabetes in South Africa by contributing to this important cause!

“Dear friends and family,

We have a very exciting project to tell you about that we hope will make a significant and very positive impact on our daughter Stacey’s future life and independence and all others who suffer chronic Type 1 diabetes in South Africa. This project is all about a Diabetic Assist Dog – otherwise known as a ‘DAD’.

A DAD is a service dog that lives with its owner in the same way a guide dog does with its blind owner and is trained to alert its diabetic owner as soon as the owner’s blood sugar levels change. The dog is aware of the change before the owner is – and before any monitoring equipment that might be used too. This warning prevents a potentially dangerous situation for the owner that can often lead to seizures, unconsciousness and hospitalisation. (Unfortunately, a situation that’s become a regular occurrence in Stacey’s life over the last few years).

DADs are life-savers!  The dogs are trained using scent detection techniques to identify changes that occur in the human body odor when blood sugar levels move above or below normal ranges. By being constant companions providing continuous glucose monitoring, DADs help their human partners maintain more independent lives and feel more in control of their diabetes.

Unfortunately, at the moment, it isn’t possible to source a DAD in South Africa. DADs are trained in other countries, primarily the USA, but not here. So, once we became aware of the potential change a DAD could make to Stacey’s life, the family made the decision to import the very first DAD to South Africa for Stacey!

After researching and contacting DAD trainers, we found a lovely lady Diane, who operates as Scent Angels located in Minneapolis USA, who has agreed to take on the challenge of exporting her first DAD to Stacey and we’re all VERY excited!

And here’s what Diane says on her website currently: http://www.scentangels.com/Announcements.html

“Introducing Gretchen our latest angel in training. Gretchen is a white German Shepherd and is in her finishing diabetic alert service dog training stage with Diane. When Gretchen’s training is complete she will head to Africa to become Stacey’s blood sugar alerter for a more independent life.”

And here’s Gretchen herself – isn’t she lovely? 

 

Having now given you all the good news, here’s the not so good – it’s going to cost in excess of R150,000 to cover the costs of training, veterinary import requirements and collection costs to bring Gretchen back to SA. Stacey and Mark will travel to Minneapolis in early January, to meet and collect Gretchen and spend a week there for Stace and her to bond and complete training.

However, this isn’t just about Stacey and Gretchen.
While Stace will be the direct beneficiary of Gretchen and her special support, and the change it will make to her life, we also hope this will be the beginning of a much larger and ambitious plan. Stacey’s ultimate goal is to use the experience to establish a local training programme for DADs so many more diabetics in SA will also be able to benefit from a DAD in the future. Clearly, the current costs preclude most diabetics from importing DADs now. Gretchen is just the beginning.

So, with this objective in mind, we’d like to ask for your support. If you’re able to make any contribution, no matter how small, to help us meet the costs of achieving our goal of bringing Gretchen to Cape Town to change Stacey’s life, and the start of a future DAD programme for SA diabetics, this would be greatly appreciated.

If you can help, this is wonderful but if you can’t, we understand completely, of course.
Should you want to make a donation, please do so into the following account and please put your name as reference.

 Thank you so much and we look forward to welcoming Gretchen to Cape Town, and many more like her in the future !!
We’ll keep you posted!

 Mark & Sue”

Bank account:
FNB
Mark Hamilton – DAD Fund
Acc No: 62435810355
Branch: 201409

Article tags

DAD diabetes Diabetic Assist Dog health wellness

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Charity

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