There are about a million ways your dog can make you healthier–from lowering your blood pressure to boosting your dating life. Here are 22 of them. There’s a bunch of awesome science below, but we also wrapped everything up into an infographic for fun. Check it out.
Key Legend:
1.Enhance Your Mood:
Dogs reduce anxiety, ameliorate stress. They also help your body lower cortisol (bad mood chemical) and release serotonin (good mood chemical).
2. Fewer Allergies:
Studies show that kids who grow up in homes with dogs are less likely to develop allergies
3. Better heart health:
Dog owners have better recovery rates from heart attacks and a lower mortality rate from cardiac disease.
4. Keeps you active:
A dog’s gotta walk, right? Dog owners, on the whole, tend to get out and exercise more than non-dog owners, and just 30 minutes of walking lowers the risk of many diseases.
5. Petting a dog fights depression:
Taking care of a pet releases both serotonin and dopamine, which helps combat depression. Plus, they’re just good listeners.
6. Contribute to lower blood pressure:
In a study of 48 stockbrokers, those who interacted with dogs had significantly lower blood pressure in stressful situations.
7. Help lower cholesterol
Dog owners tend to have lower cholesterol and triglyceride levels (some researchers think it’s because they tend to be more active).
8. They can be therapy professionals
Plenty of counselors use dogs in therapy, and there are lots of organizations who service dogs to help people with all kinds of disabilities.
9. Partners in cancer research
There’s research being done for both human cancer and doggy cancer. Since dogs can get the same kinds of cancer we can, the research benefits everyone,
10. A sense of community:
Pet owners love talking to each other, and dogs are great conversation starters. They can even help you get a date or two! This is great for shy or isolated folks.
11. Dog owners often have stronger bones:
Walking a dog is lightly active-bearing activity, which helps strengthen both joints and muscles.
12. Dogs can detect blood sugar crashes:
It usually takes some training, but some dogs can smell their owner’s blood sugar begins to crash, alerting them that its time for a snack.
13. Boost your dating life
There are massive dating communities, like YouMustLoveDogsDating.com, specifically geared toward dog owners seeking other dog owners.
14. Lend focus to folks with ADHD:
Dogs can help ADHD sufferers plan, focus, relive, stress, exercise, release excess energy, and even fall asleep.
15. Good listeners for aphasia
Apashia, a language disorder, often makes it difficult to speak. Dogs can be trained to understand a variety of commands, boosting a patient’s confidence when the dog understands them.
16. Sensory stimuli for autistic children:
A friendly, loving dog can help an autistic child get used to feeling things against their skin. They can also give them something safe to focus on in overwhelming environments.
17. Your personal heating pad
If your dog’s a cuddle bug, you can use her as a heating pad. In fact, in many places, dogs help provide relief from chronic pain with their natural body heat.
18. Can detect cancer:
Dogs can be trained to sniff out cancer in the same way they can be trained to sniff out drugs. One dog named Panda correctly identified 33 of 38 colorectal cancer cases!
19. An outlet for arthritis:
People with arthritis can benefit from light exercises, like tossing a Frisbee around with Fido. It’s also just a fun distraction.
20. Stronger immune systems
Studies also show that children raised around dogs have higher levels of a few key immune chemicals, giving them strong immune systems.
21. Seizure alerts
Dogs can also be trained to bark if their owner is having a seizure, others are trained to buddy up and get super close to prevent injury.
22. Calm you down
One study showed that AIDS patients were significantly less likely to become depressed if they interacted with a dog on a regular basis.