Juanita Mengel holds her cat Lola-Pearl in her home in Amanda, Ohio on Monday, Dec. 11, 2023. AP Photo/Patrick Orsagos
Each morning when she wakes up, Juanita Mengel removes the silicone liner of her prosthetic leg out from below a heated blanket in order that the metallic components of the unreal limb don’t really feel as chilly on her pores and skin when she straps the items collectively.
The 67-year-old Amanda, Ohio, resident then does the identical for her 5-year-old dilute tortoiseshell cat, Lola-Pearl, who’s lacking her left hind leg.
The duo is one in all an estimated 200 remedy cat groups registered within the U.S. via Pet Partners. The nonprofit units up house owners and their pets as volunteer groups offering animal-assisted interventions, the place they may go to hospitals, nursing properties or faculties to assist in remedy and different actions to enhance well-being in communities.
“A therapy animal is an animal who’s been assessed based on their ability to meet new people and not just tolerate the interaction, but actively enjoy it,” mentioned Taylor Chastain Griffin, the nationwide director of animal-assisted interventions development on the organization.
Pet Partners registers 9 totally different species as remedy animals: dogs, cats, horses, rabbits, guinea pigs, rats, birds, mini pigs, and llamas and alpacas.
As a part of her analysis, Chastain Griffin research the affect of remedy cats and argues extra analysis must be achieved. There’s plentiful analysis on different remedy animals like dogs, she mentioned, however there’s usually a “shock factor” concerned with remedy cats as a result of many don’t know they exist.
“They go into a setting and people are like, ‘Whoa, there’s a cat on a leash. What’s happening?’” Chastain Griffin mentioned. “It kind of inspires people to connect in a way we haven’t traditionally heard talked about in other therapy animal interventions.”
Mengel mentioned she knew Lola-Pearl can be remedy cat after she introduced her on a whim to an amputee coalition convention a few month after she adopted the home shorthair.
“She was so good with people I just knew she would be a good therapy cat,” Mengel mentioned. “People really were attracted to her, too.”
During a recent go to to a limb loss assist group assembly, Mengel pushed Lola-Pearl round in a stroller — labeled “Therapy Cat” — so attendees might pet the kitty as she awoke from a nap.
Whether she was sitting within the stroller, walking in between individuals’ legs or cuddling on their laps, Lola-Pearl introduced a smile to whoever she determined was worthy of her consideration in that second.
“She’s very intuitive of people,” Mengel mentioned.
Lola-Pearl isn’t the one cat in Mengel’s life; the previous touring nurse who misplaced her left leg in 2006 after years of surgical procedures following a near-fatal automobile accident is a mom to seven felines, most of which have disabilities.
“They find you, you don’t find them,” she mentioned.
Lola-Pearl was discovered at only some weeks old along with her again legs fully twisted collectively. She was unable to walk and dropped at a good friend of Mengel’s at an animal shelter in Missouri, the place veterinarians couldn’t assist her. The shelter discovered specialists in Iowa who had been capable of splint Lola-Pearl’s legs as an try to avoid wasting them, however they determined her left hind leg wanted to be amputated.
Meanwhile, Mengel had been in talks along with her good friend in Missouri about adopting the cat, and after Lola-Pearl healed from surgical procedure, Mengel formally adopted her.
Despite the obstacles Mengel has been via, she exudes a spirit of gratitude for Lola-Pearl and for the work they do collectively.
“It’s a really rewarding experience,” she mentioned, “I get just as much out of it as the people that I visit.”
