Animal-Assisted Human Services

By Eileen Bona

Unlock the benefits of working with animals in your human-services practice

Interacting with animals has many benefits for human well-being. This understanding is now being applied and standardized in human-services fields such as counselling, physiotherapy, and education.

Being an animal-assisted human services (AAHS) professional involves a lot more than just bringing an animal to work. Safe and effective AAHS involves proper training, a clear scope of practice, and close attention to animal welfare.

Eileen Bona, a therapist who has been working with animals in practice for more than twenty years, developed the first college-accredited course in animal-assisted wellness in English in Canada and played a leading role in the creation of a voluntary national standard for AAHS practice. Clear standards are beginning to emerge in this rapidly growing field, so professionals who want to incorporate animals into their practice now have clear pathways to success.

Throughout this book, scenarios and reflection questions put readers in the role of practitioners, making them consider safety, ethics, client needs, animal welfare, and professional decision making.

Topics covered include:

The history of animal-assisted human services, which dates to the 1600s The latest research into the benefits of human-animal relations Laws, standards, and codes of ethics that AAHS practitioners need to understand How to select, screen, and evaluate service animals, along with information on the most common species used in AAHS

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1550599674
• ISBN13: 9781550599671
• Release Date: December 2026
• Publisher: Brush Education
• Length: 306 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 6.0" x 9.0"