Has anyone seen the Larry King segment scheduled for April 02/08? It was about autistic children and service dogs. I missed it, but have in front of me a newspaper article published in the Medicine Hat (Alberta) news.
In a nutshell the article talks about the close relationship this autistic child has with her service dog, and how much he has helped her. Of course, that's the whole idea why we have service dogs - to help people with one disability or another.
Great for the people but I always wonder what's in it for the dog? Here is this little puppy carefully chosen who lives for about a year with a social group he/she bonds strongly to, just to be removed to go for further, intense training with strangers. If he passes the requirements he'll be teamed up yet with another person and put to work. While he has his vest on nobody is allowed to touch/talk to him as not to distract. In other words, all natural behaviors stop and trained/shaped ones take over.
That is his life until he gets too old to be of any use, called retired, and might be re-homed again, while his life-long companion he served well gets a new dog, another trained one who costs several thousand dollars.

A couple of years ago there was a similar segment on the CTV Calgary News at Noon. In that case the family became aware of the benefits a dog could have for their autistic child when a rescue dog walked into their lives. Even though, according to the mother, the pooch/child team bonded and the dog made no mistakes, he wasn't a "real service dog" and didn't quite cut it. The family surrendered him - he had to leave to make room for the expensive trained one. During the segment the child, also diagnosed with ADHD, repeatedly taunted and grabbed him, and I wondered if that was the reason why the rescue pooch didn't cut it. Unlike the service dog who tolerated it all, trained to be calm and stoic regardless what humans do, the rescue pooch might have walked away.I am not blaming the child, but heck did I feel sorry for the dog.

During that time I happened to meet another mother with an autistic son regularly at the dog park. They chose to keep their rescue dog. She also reported that the dog greatly benefitted the family and her son, but also admitted that sometimes she has to protect the dog and interfere on his behalf and control the child. Imagine that! Control the child. What a concept. She admitted that it took some effort in the beginning, it took time to work with child and dog.

Makes me think? There are so many great dogs capable of working/helping humans in many different ways. It might take a little more effort on the part of the owner than the ready-to-go service dog. But it would also mean that many disabled and challenged people who are waiting years for an expensive dog, could have one sooner. And many wonderful rescue dogs could find a forever home.