They say ‘laughter is the best medicine’ but maybe we should change the age-old adage to ‘dogs are the best medicine’.
If you own a dog or are just an animal lover, you know that dogs have the power to make us feel happy and positive even after the worst days. Every time we come home, they are there, wagging their tails and excited to see us. They really are incredible creatures. Flavio Santos knows this all too well.
Flavio Santos of Brazil has been sick in the hospital for a few weeks. Flavio was being treated at a local Brazilian hospital for cancer. It’s been a trying few weeks for the Brazilian man. On top of battling his cancer and dealing with all the nasty side effects from treatment, he was also missing his best friend during the whole process – that best friend is his dog named Agadir.
Flavio kept talking about his dog during his entire hospital and nurses were starting to realize just how much Agadir meant to him.
Soon, the nurses decided to hatch a plan for Flavio. They decided that they would arrange for Agadir to come visit him in the hospital, in hopes that it would raise his spirits. Little did they know – it would do a whole lot more than that.
Finally, after weeks apart, Agadir was brought to the hospital to love and comfort his favorite human. It was an incredible moment and it would bring about a miracle that nobody saw coming.
Once the two friends were back together, it was clearly an emotional reunion for both of them.
The reunion wasn’t only a momentous occasion for the two of them since it had been so long since they had seen one another, but the doctors started to notice a significant change in Flavio’s condition after his visit with Agadir.
“I was surprised,” Dr. Rodrigo Tancredi told news outlet Globo. “He was conscious, oriented and talking.”
Dr. Tancredi went on to say that he’s seen things like this before. Pets seem to have amazing psychological and physical health benefits. This can lead to an increased appetite, lower heart rate, and lower blood pressure.
“We visibly noticed his improvement the other day,” Tancredi said. “The improvement occurred in a gradual way and remains.”
Flavio’s health has improved so much that doctors believe he and Agadir will be permanently reunited again soon.
“I talked about the possibility of him being discharged [from the hospital],” Tancredi said.
Most of the time, hospitals don’t allow pets in hospitals unless they’ve been trained service dogs. However, we hope that stories like this will bring awareness to how beneficial pets can be in the healing process and we can have policies change regarding pets. It’s clear that they’re just as healing as medicine.
What do you think about this story? Do you think that pets have the power to heal? Should pets be allowed in hospitals? We’d love to know your thoughts!
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