The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Animals as therapy to treat people with disabilities

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jul 31, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Animals as therapy to treat people with disabilities

Shilpa Sebastian R.

Minal Kavishwar uses animal assisted therapy (AAT)

— PHOTO: K. GOPINATHAN

Healing touch: Minal Kavishwar, the psychologist who uses animal therapy.

Bangalore: Minal Kavishwar is a clinical psychologist who uses animals as therapy to treat disabled people, autistic children and those with severe behavioural problems. “It is called animal assisted therapy (AAT),” explains Ms. Kavishwar who is also a certified practitioner from Delta Society, an organisation that works with AAT.

Ms. Kavishwar started off as a psychologist before using animals for therapy, four years ago. “Animal therapy is very new in India, and now people are opening up to this beautiful world,” says Ms. Kavishwar, who was in the city for the International Conference on Psychology by NIMHANS where she presented a paper on AAT for autism, based on the research she is currently pursuing in Pune.

According to her, animals are ideal for therapy as they are agreeable friends; they ask no questions and make no judgments. Animals treat everyone in the same way. The love shown by animals touches the hearts of those suffering from mental disorders. It gives them hope and motivation to lead a better life. Animals also come in handy when a clinical person has to win the trust of a patient who has a disturbed mind.

“We are not into the medicinal field where we can treat a person with medication. We have to treat them with love and help them overcome their helplessness,” explains Ms. Kavishwar. She prefers to use dogs in most of her therapies as they are the “most interactive and sensitive animals. “The dogs that we use in our therapies are brought up as personalities. That is, they know that when they wear the therapy jackets they are on duty and show extremely controlled behaviour and are gentle to all those they interact with. Once the therapy jacket is off, they can be ‘normal’ dogs, barking and jumping and just being themselves,” said Ms. Kavishwar who runs the Animal Angels Foundation in Pune that works on AAT and mental health.

Ms. Kavishwar also uses different animals for different therapies. “We use rabbits for old-age homes as the people are physically weak, and dogs are used for younger people who have more physical energy. Fishes are used for those with extreme anxiety and blood pressure or those with depression, as watching them has a calming effect on one’s mind. Fishes are also the least interactive among all others. So these patients can simply sit and watch them. In fact, watching fish is so good that it will even calm you down in five minutes,” says Ms. Kavishwar, who plans to start a centre in Bangalore soon.

She appeals to psychologists who are interested to volunteer to work with her organisation.

“It is an open invitation to psychologists, animal lovers and pet owners to come forward to work with me,” says this avid animal lover who promises to come back to our city more often with “as many workshops and therapies as possible.”

Ms. Kavishwar can be contacted on 09421004291, 09325025250 or animal-angels@animalangels.org.in. You can also contact Bangalore volunteers Anita on 22238184 or Anil Nayak on 9845442250.

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