Causes: Civil Rights, Disabilities, Disabled Persons Rights

Mission: Psychiatric Service Dog Partners’ purpose is to promote the mental health of people using service dogs for psychiatric disabilities by educating, advocating, providing expertise, facilitating peer support, and promoting responsible service dog training and handling.

Results: In line with community members’ priorities in our 2016 survey results, by 9/13/17 we:
• updated our online peer guidance group to serve the individualized needs of 214 members (down from 271 last year, after an extensive “Summer Cleaning” and list migration—was 173 in 2015). We reached the technical limits of our old host and had to find a new host that could meet our active community’s demands!
• expanded our website to have over 160 pages (from 130 last year), with almost 600,000 pageviews and over 300,000 visitors. Our site had an average Google search position of 1–2.0 for 1125 different search queries (from 357 last year).
• hosted a convivial convention in Rock Hill, SC, with an average session rating of 4.836 out of 5 (up from 4.741 last year) and comments like:"PSDP Convention is a great way to grow as a service dog team. Yes, I was nervous going but the benefits sure outweighed the challenges of my MI. Everyone was so welcoming and understanding. "
• advocated with community help on many fronts. PSDP has become more involved with international advocacy, encouraging Canada to do the right thing by service dog users. This involvement includes engaging the USAUSA coalition to put the power of other organizations behind causes we care about.
• partnered with other groups to provide relief to those affected by major hurricanes
• started a project to encourage service-dog-related art therapy through social media (#PSDPrompt)

Target demographics: people with disabilities, the general public, businesses, and government agencies

Direct beneficiaries per year: approx. 214 peer guidance group members and even more direct public contact requests for information. Our website garners around half a million pageviews a year, which is incredibly high for our niche!

Geographic areas served: primarily the United States, but we also advise and support those in other countries (historically, Canada, the UK, Australia, and Germany)

Programs: diverse outreach activities (public and corporate education), an amazing annual service dog convention, a website at the vanguard of service dog related education, and an intensive peer guidance system that dramatically promotes disability mitigation, life engagement, and responsible service dog handling.