Pawsitively Jude! Meet the facility dog bringing love and comfort to kids in the hospital

Health Spotlight | Pawsitively Jude!

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — You’ve heard of service dogs, therapy dogs, and emotional support dogs.

But now, we want to introduce you to a growing new trend happening across the country. They are called “facility dogs.”

A facility dog’s mission is to bring love and comfort to children during what can be some of the scariest and most stressful times in their young lives. Like Jude, a Labrador retriever who works with the kids at Wolfson Children’s Hospital in Jacksonville, Florida.

Jude knows the basic commands, like sit, stay, and roll over – but he knows so much more, too!

Jude is a specially trained facility dog — working 40 hours a week alongside Kara Williams, a child life specialist at Wolfson and her owner.

From helping patients work on motor skills to bringing down stress levels, Jude makes daily rounds with Williams to check in on the kids.

“I feel like sometimes he can sense when kids aren’t feeling well, and he can just go lay on the bed and just give them sort of like a deep pressure, comfort hold,” Williams said. “ (And) if we need a patient to get up out of their bed and ambulate, a good motivator for that is Jude.”

For a patient named Bishop — Jude takes his mind off his painful tonsils. He says since meeting Jude, his hospital stay has been happier.

For another patient in the hospital recovering from a bad case of pneumonia, Jude has served as a calming presence. “(Jude) just brings like a smile on her face and gives her a chance to forget about the bed, to walk around, to play,” the patient’s mom said.

Jude spent the first two years of his life being trained as a service dog — then used those skills inside the hospital.

And now, he’s on call for everything from prepping a patient for surgery, calming them when they need an IV, and just to be there when they need a little extra love and support.

This story was created from a script aired on WISH-TV. Health Spotlight is presented by Community Health Network.