Frequently asked questions

• What does Canine Therapy Corps do?

• Can I certify my dog to be a personal therapy dog?

• Can I certify my dog to come to work with me at my practice/hospital/university/etc.?

• Does Canine Therapy Corps travel for outreach events? Can I certify my dog to work in my home area?

• Does Canine Therapy Corps provide home visits?

• Does Canine Therapy Corps have on-site visitation opportunities?

• I work at a social services organization that would benefit from a Canine Therapy Corps volunteer team visit. How do I request a visit and how much does it cost?

• My corporation would like to bring in therapy dogs for an event. How do I apply and how much does it cost?

• Is there an age requirement for my dog to be assessed for therapy work?

• How old do you have to be to volunteer with Canine Therapy Corps?

• Where can I volunteer with my dog?

• Do you take volunteers without dogs?

• What does your Therapy Dog Assessment entail?

• What training is required to certify my dog? How long will it take? How much will it cost?

Canine Therapy Corps utilizes the power of the human-animal bond to provide goal-directed and interactive animal-assisted therapy interventions to promote and encourage psychological and physical well-being. For example, volunteers may assist a person who has suffered a stroke to complete physical exercises to regain use of the affected part of their body (ex. using simple hand commands, such as “come” or “stay,” or throwing a ball for the dog with the affected arm).

We mobilize teams of volunteers to handle Canine Therapy Corps-certified therapy dogs in a variety of healthcare and human services settings, including but not limited to: hospitals, social service organizations, rehabilitation/recovery programs, and schools. (See our Programs page for more information.) Our therapy dogs are typically owned by the volunteers who handle them and are regular pets at home. Canine Therapy Corps does not adopt or own any dogs directly.

What makes Canine Therapy Corps truly unique is that we primarily provide animal-assisted therapy and animal-assisted education programs. Animal-assisted therapy (AAT) is a structured, interactive, goal-directed intervention in which health, education, or human service professionals utilize trained, certified animals (in our case dogs) as an integral part of the human therapy, rehabilitation, or treatment process. In animal-assisted therapy, exercises or curricula are custom-tailored and specifically designed around an individual's or a population's therapeutic goals and a therapy dog's skills inventory. Animal-assisted education (AAE) is very similar, but focuses specifically on academic goals, social skills, and cognitive functioning.

By contrast, animal-assisted activities (AAA) or visitation are when dogs visit patients in hospitals, residents in assisted-living facilities, or individuals at other institutions to give and receive affection and generally make people smile. Beyond the innate benefits of the human-animal bond, no therapeutic goals are enumerated. These therapy dogs generally visit to bring distraction and cheer. Canine Therapy Corps participates in some programs and events of this type, but it is not our primary focus, and all of Canine Therapy Corps’ volunteers are required to participate in at least one animal-assisted therapy program prior to participating in an animal-assisted activities/visitation program. If this is the type of volunteering you are interested in, we suggest certifying with an organization focused on this type of work, such as Pet Partners.

It is important to note that Canine Therapy Corps certifies and runs programs for therapy dogs exclusively – not service animals or emotional support animals (ESAs). The difference is that therapy dogs do not serve the individuals they live with – they are well-trained to go out and volunteer with their handler among a variety of populations. They do not, however, provide physical or emotional support for their owner, like service animals and ESAs do. We do not train or certify ESAs or service animals.

Mainly, therapy animals are well-trained and tested companion animals that volunteer with their owners (or another handler), providing support and companionship to others in the community. At home, they are regular pets and do not provide any type of formal support to individuals in their households.

Here are some helpful references if you are seeking a service animal or ESA:

• International Association of Assistance Dog Partners (IAADP) Minimum Training Standards for Public Access

• Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Service Animal Requirements

• Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Obligations of Housing Providers in Regards to Service Animals

• List of Service/Assistance or Guide Dog Organizations

This chart provides a quick reference of the difference between Therapy Animals, Service/Assistance Animals, and Emotional Support Animals:

Canine Therapy Corps does is not a therapy dog registry. Our certification is only valid to work in the programs that Canine Therapy Corps runs, so you would not be able to take your dog to your work facility (unless you happen to work in one of our program facilities). Therapy dogs are also typically only trained to work for a few hours at a time, so they would not well-equipped to be on-site for full workdays. Even if they only “worked” a few hours out of the day, it still requires a great deal of training and effort for dogs to be well-behaved in the face of distractions for so many hours.

If you are looking for a dog that could be on-site full time, that would be considered a facility dog. Facility dogs work on-site in a specific facility full time, unlike therapy dogs which work in many different settings for only a few hours at a time. Many service dog organizations, such as Canine Companions for Independence, Service Dogs for America and Dogs for Better Lives, provide facility dogs.

Please note that Canine Therapy Corps is not a therapy dog registry.  Our certification is only valid to work in the programs that Canine Therapy Corps runs in the city of Chicago and select near suburbs.  If you are looking for therapy dog programs with more geographic and/or programmatic flexibility, we recommend certifying with a national therapy dog registry, such as Pet Partners.

Since our programs and events are largely staffed by volunteers who live in Chicago, we are unable to travel outside of the Chicago city limits to provide services. Please visit our Related Organizations page for therapy dog programs with more geographic and/or programmatic flexibility that may be able to accommodate your outreach request.

We wish we could accommodate every kind of visitation request, but unfortunately, we cannot offer home visits. Therapy Dogs International lists home visits as a service that they provide, so you might try reaching out to them. 

We are pleased to offer on-site visits at Canine Therapy Corps headquarters! If you are interested in scheduling a field trip to our office, please email info@caninetherapycorps.org. Please note that we request 2 months' notice and availability is limited.

Great! Please complete an outreach request form.  Outreach events are free of charge, but donations are encouraged if possible. Please note that we need to schedule events at least two months in advance, so be aware of that when submitting your request.  

For corporations, businesses, or professional associations, we have a special program called “Partners In Healing,” which provides therapy animals for corporate events. Because businesses and corporations fall outside of our regular service populations, we request that corporations and businesses make a tax-deductible donation in exchange for our services. Canine Therapy Corps does not receive government funding or insurance reimbursement for our services. Instead, we rely solely on the generosity of individuals, foundations, and corporations to sustain our valuable work.

For more information, please complete a corporate event request form.

Dogs must be at least a year old in order to be eligible to complete our certification test.

All volunteers must be 16 years of age or older.

Once certified, volunteers can serve in professionally-led Canine Therapy Corps programs with their dogs as they are scheduled. Read our current list of programs here!  All of our programs are located in the city of Chicago and Park Ridge.

Yes! We have a limited amount of opportunities for individuals to assist with our certification sessions. However, our greatest need is for individuals who can certify their dogs and staff our programs. If you would like to be notified of our next orientation session to volunteer without a dog, fill out this form.

Canine Therapy Corps’ therapy dog assessment is a 14-exercise test, which is used to measure various temperament and obedience factors to simulate real-life visits. For example, we need to make sure dogs can visit with an individual amidst distractions, including but not limited to: another dog being present, unfamiliar hospital equipment, as well as the basic commands of “sit”, “stay”, “heel” and “come”.

A copy of our test is on our Forms and Downloads page for review.

Each dog is required to have taken a 6-week group obedience class or four private training sessions with a professional before taking the therapy dog assessment.  Unfortunately, puppy training classes aren’t eligible to be counted towards the training requirement. Other than that, there is no required training process for each therapy dog – however you want to train your dog for the assessment is up to you.  That said, most candidates require professional assistance to pass the assessment.   

How long the training process will take depends entirely on how much training your dog has already had, how well you have maintained that training, and how quickly the dog learns.  It is different for everyone.  Likewise, the cost is also very dependent on these factors.  Some individuals pick up training methods easily and are able to pass the test with a majority of training taking place on their own, while others may spend hundreds or even thousands of dollars on professional training resources. 

Need training resources? We have a resource sheet with dog trainers who have helped others pass our test on our Forms and Downloads page. We also offer group, private and day training sessions at Canine Therapy Corps!