ElderPet Therapy Animal Program

If you have a well-behaved, well-mannered and socialized pet who loves people and you have time to volunteer, you may want to consider becoming part of the Pet Partners Therapy Animal Program!

Here is a link to a short presentation that will tell you how you and your pet may become Pet Partners. Most of the material is repeated below.

Link: How to Volunteer With Pet Partners

ElderPet is a Community Partner of Pet Partners. ElderPet provides the Pet Partners Handler Course and Team Evaluations for owners and their pets (as a team!) for visiting animal programs in hospitals, nursing homes, rehabilitation centers, schools and other facilities. Once completing this process (course and evaluation) and having a veterinary evaluation for the pet, and having a backgrpound check, the team is eligible for registration with Pet Partners.

Pet Partners Program Requirements may be found here.  ElderPet recommends strongly that if your prospective therapy animal is a dog, that you and your dog take a basic obedience or AKC CGC class before signing up for an evaluation.

Pet Partners has a deep regard and respect for its therapy animal teams and the important role that they play in meeting the needs of the people they interact with. Pet Partners also has high expectations regarding conduct of its teams. Pet Partners has developed Policies and Procedures that teams must follow. They may be found here.

If you find that you meet the requirements and agree to the Pet Partners Policies and Procedures, you would then take the Handler Course. This can be taken in-person with ElderPet in NH (See link above for schedule and print registration forms. ) or on line through Pet Partners.

Register with Pet Partners Volunteer Center

Whether you wish to take the course on-line or in-person, you will need to register through the Pet Partners Volunteer Center. You should do this before you send in your print registration as that will be your official registrations date. First, if you have not already done so, you will need to create a login and password at the Pet Partners website.  Once logged into the volunteer site, you will see the link My Registrations. This will take through the steps to start or renew your registration through a series of steps.

Once you have signed up for the course, you may sign up for an evaluation.  ElderPet offers evaluations in NH but there are other evaluations scheduled in Maine and NH that you can find on the Pet Partners website if our schedule does not meet yours.  (See link above for evaluation schedule).