Friday was the national Bring your Dog to Work Day, but for Sadie, a 7-year-old white lab, it was just another day on the job at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo.
Recreation Therapist Heather Hinton, and her therapy dog, Sadie, help patient Sandy Chisam get back to her room at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Patient Sandy Chisam visits with Sadie, a 7-year-old therapy dog, at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Recreation Therapist Heather Hinton, and her therapy dog, Sadie, visit with patient Sandy Chisam in the Acute Rehabilitation Unit at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Sadie, a 7-year-old therapy dog, visits patients at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Sadie, a 7-year-old therapy dog, visits patients at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Sadie, a 7-year-old therapy dog, visits patients at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Patient Sandy Chisam visits with Sadie, a 7-year-old therapy dog, at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Sadie, a 7-year-old therapy dog, waits by her owner, Recreation Therapist Heather Hinton, in the Acute Rehabilitation Unit, at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Recreation Therapist Heather Hinton, and her therapy dog, Sadie, visit patient Jennifer Godinez in her room at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Recreation Therapist Heather Hinton, and her therapy dog, Sadie, are on the Acute Rehabilitation Unit organization chart at Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, CA, on Friday, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
Recreation Therapist Heather Hinton, Sadie’s owner, relaunched the pet therapy program for the hospital’s Acute Rehabilitation Unit in November.
She had planned to bring the program back in 2020, but like everything else, it was delayed by the coronavirus pandemic. But now, the therapy duo are regularly at the hospital helping patients as they recover.
Hinton said she was inspired to get a therapy dog by her grandmother who, as Hinton describes her, “wasn’t really a dog person,” but was comforted by canine visits when she was hospitalized. It was then Hinton said she decided she “wanted a dog that could bring joy and comfort to other people as well.”
She got Sadie seven years ago through a breeder that specializes in mellow dogs; they both were certified through Love on 4 Paws, and at 8-months-old, Sadie was ready to go into hospitals.
Patient Jennifer Godinez, who was in the hospital because of a leg she broke doing jujitsu, has met Sadie a few times. Godinez said she’s got a pup at home and getting to visit with the therapy dog, “makes me feel a little more at home.”
Therapy Supervisor Jessica Rojas said the Acute Rehabilitation Unit therapists help people who have had strokes, have persistent ailments from COVID-19, are suffering from multi-traumas and so on.
The therapy to get better is intensive, she said, the work takes a lot of energy from the patients. A visit from Sadie can only help.
And having Sadie at the hospital is also good for the hard-working therapists, who “on their break time, can have a little joy and fun.”