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Introducing Your Dog to the Pool

Rock Pool. An Ocean pool in Sydney, New South ...
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Many dogs love the water and are good swimmers. This is great exercise and great fun for dog and owner alike, as long as good safety precautions are followed at all times. It is important to take care in introducing your dog to the water so that he will not fear the water and know that it is okay to play.

Start with a Pool
A private swimming pool is the best place to start out with your dog. There are no other people, obstacles, or currents to worry about and your dog can explore the water peacefully with your undivided attention.

Go Slowly
Take your time when you introduce your dog to the swimming pool. Some dogs don’t like the water and it may take some time for them to be comfortable standing in the pool. Chances are you will already know if you have a dog that dislikes bathtime and may fear the pool too. Let your dog stand in shallow water and step around on his own at first. Your dog may splash in the water and this is a great sign that he is getting used to the new surroundings.

Offer Praise
Praise your dog with attention and pets as he plays in the water and continue this action each time he comes into the water. This will show your dog that the water is safe and that you want him to explore it.

Go Further
Once your dog is feeling comfortable in shallow water, you can gauge the best way to proceed. Some dogs will begin to paddle out on their own and you can throw a ball for them to bring back to the shallow end. This is a great way to help them explore their new skill in a controlled environment with a goal. Other dogs may need to be carried further in to know that it’s safe. Introducing your dog to swimming can be a great gift.

Filed Under: Medical Care, Need to Know Tagged With: , , ,

Cautions For Your Dog at the Pool

Keeping your family dog safe at the swimming pool can have a lot in common with keeping small children safe. It is important to closely monitor their swimming and their behavior to be sure they are safe in the pool. Older dogs may also tire quickly from swimming and it is important to keep a close eye on them throughout your time outside.

Watch The Heat
Dogs can overheat very easily in the hot sun, the area in and around the pool tends to get even more sunlight than the yard. Be sure to provide plenty of fresh water for your pet while they are outside and take periodical breaks to encourage them to drink. It’s also smart to set a timer for a reasonable amount of time so that you take your dog inside to cool off and rest before he becomes overtired or dehydrated.

Be Careful of Chlorine
A heavily chlorinated pool can irritate your dogs eyes and cause them to become red and ooze. Your best line of defense is to keep your pet away from the water when you have just chlorinated. To fend off regular damage from chlorine, rinse your pets coat immediately after getting out the pool. This will remove excess chlorine and prevent skin irritation or an upset stomach from licking it off later on.

Consider an Alarm
Some dogs will find a way to get through even a strong gate and fence. Pet owners may consider a floating alarm for the pool. This device sits on the water and will go off if it senses movement. An alarm will ring in the house to alert you that someone is in the pool. This can be a smart decision for anyone with children and pets, or anyone who lives in a neighborhood where pets and children could find a way into the pool area when no one is around.

Filed Under: Emergencies, Need to Know Tagged With: , , ,

Helping a Worried Child Handle Emergency Preparedness

Some children are natural worriers the same way that other children are naturally quiet or naturally athletic. When you are raising a child who tends to worry about bad situations, it can be tough to know how to talk about disasters and emergency preparedness. Still, it is important to have discussions and find ways to calm fears through information.

Have a Plan
You may worry about upsetting a worried child with details about an emergency plan, but many worriers feel better when they know that the adults in their life have thought things through and know how to take care of them in an emergency. Go over the details of your plan and what you would do in each situation. Go over the roles of each family member and what things the child is responsible for during an emergency (eg: getting to safety, finding a parent or trusted adult).

Answer Questions
Encourage your child to ask questions about different types of emergencies or what would happen in a situation. If you don’t know the answer, you can look for it together and learn more about what you would do. It is important for you both to answer questions and know how to act in a disaster. When a child has their questions answered, they often begin to relax and feel ready for any situation they may face in the future.

Discuss the Odds
It is important to remind all children, especially worried children, that we make emergency plans and hope that we never have to use them. In fact, most people who make plans will never find themselves in a situation where they need to use it. Plans are made to keep us safe just in case. You can use funny examples to stress the odds of things happening and help your child to feel better about the idea of the plan.

Filed Under: Emergencies, Medical Care, Need to Know Tagged With: , , ,

Health

Breast Cancer Research

The National Center for Policy Research for Women and Families is examining what research tells us about the options facing women who are diagnosed with breast cancer. These articles reflect our concerns that women are not always given all the information they need to make the choices that are best for them.

This article is based on “The Need for Improved Informed Consent for Breast Cancer Patients”, published in the fall 2000 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Women’s Association.

Unnecessary Mastectomies:

Are Breast Cancer Patients Given Accurate Information About their Options_

By Diana Zuckerman, Ph.D.

It is shocking but true: approximately one out of every two American women who have a breast removed as treatment for cancer do not need such radical surgery. Whether a woman undergoes a mastectomy or a lumpectomy (which removes the cancer but not the breast) depends less on her specific diagnosis than on other factors, such as where she lives, her income and health insurance, where she receives medical care, her age, and when her doctor was trained.

Although it’s been known for years that lumpectomy and other breast-saving surgeries are just as effective as mastectomy for patients in the early stages of breast cancer, in most parts of the country most of the women who receive an early-stage diagnosis will undergo the more radical and disfiguring surgery. Limited information and biased recommendations are undermining breast cancer patients’ choices.

Articles published in some of America’s most prestigious journals show that many of the more than 182,000 women who are newly diagnosed with breast cancer every year do not have access to all the information they need to make the treatment choices that are best for them. This raises questions about what doctors know and what they are telling their patients.

In addition, mastectomy is often followed by “reconstructive” breast surgery that involves the use of synthetic breast implants or tissue transfers from other parts of the body. These reconstructive surgeries have risks, but the lack of published epidemiological studies means that many of the women making these decisions have limited information about their safety.

After all the research that has been done on the safety of lumpectomies, why are so many women undergoing mastectomies they don’t need and then having reconstruction that can cause serious problems_ One reason may be economic. In many facilities, it’s actually cheaper to remove a breast than it is to perform a lumpectomy and provide the necessary follow-up radiation therapy.

Some striking research findings include:

In some hospitals, all breast cancer patients had mastectomies, regardless of their diagnosis. In one large urban hospital serving mostly poor women in Texas, 84% of the women with early stage breast cancer had mastectomies and only 16% had lumpectomies.

In a study of 157 hospitals, patients treated by doctors trained before 1981 were less likely to have lumpectomies or other breast-saving surgery than women who had younger doctors.

One study indicated that women getting mastectomies were more likely to have followed their doctors’ recommendations, but women getting lumpectomies were more likely to have obtained a second opinion, and felt more actively involved in making the decision.

A study of 175 surgeons found that even doctors who know that lumpectomy is as safe as mastectomy may persuade their patients to get mastectomies by making subtly biased recommendations. Other studies showed that some women were not even told that lumpectomies were an option.

Women deserve better. Breast cancer patients should make the choices that are best for them, wherever they live and no matter how affluent they are. We need to do a better job of making sure that all doctors and their patients have accurate, unbiased information so that women can make those choices, no matter who they are, or who provides their medical care.

The National Center for Policy Research (CPR) for Women and Families is an independent, nonprofit think tank in Washington, DC, which “translates” medical and scientific information into news that can be used by consumers, policy makers, and the media. Contact us for more information or visit our Web site at .

Please visit our Newsroom for the Press Release of this article.

To read the article as it appears in JAMWA, click here.

Filed Under: Medical Care, Need to Know, Prevention

Setting Rules about Pool Parties

Last swimming pool party-108
Image by Julie70 via Flickr

You set the rules of your pool for children and children’s parties, but what about adult’s pool parties over the summer? While adults should know how to keep themselves safe at the pool, rules do vary and it is important to introduce a few basics to your parties to keep everyone safe.

Explain Depths
If the depth of your swimming pool is not readily apparent, take a few minutes to explain this to everyone. It’s just too easy for someone to think they’re jumping into eight feet of water when it’s actually only five. This can be an easy way for an adult, even an experienced swimmer and jumper, to get badly hurt. Explaining depths is also a helpful tip for people looking to sit by the pool or lounge in a few feet of water instead of going all the way in. Framing it as a helpful tip will keep it as a kind gesture instead of a safety lecture.

Set Food Rules
It’s your pool, it’s okay if you don’t feel comfortable with people eating in it. Set up tables and inviting spaces away from the pool, where people who are eating can still feel like part of the party, but aren’t encouraged to take their appetizers into the shallow end. Most guests will be completely understanding about these guidelines and anyone with a pool will understand that you don’t want to be fishing desserts out of the skimmer for the next three weeks.

Swimming and Alcohol
If there will be drinks at your pool party, be vigilant about people who are drinking staying out of the swimming pool and staying safe. Swimming while under the influence can be dangerous and diving, even after only a couple drinks, is not a good idea. Even slightly slowed reaction times can cause big problems in the water. It’s worth being strict to keep everyone safe.

Filed Under: Need to Know, Parents Needs Tagged With: , , ,
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