K-9 Correspondents

By Cathryn Domrose
November 12, 2002

Brandon, 13, has cancer. For six months, he has been corresponding with Ram, a lab/doberman mix from Colorado Springs, about 120 miles from Brandon's home in Loveland, Colo. Ram also has cancer.

"I never knew dogs could get cancer," Brandon told Anne Ingalls, RN, a pediatric oncology nurse at The Children's Hospital in Denver and co-director of a program that matches children with cancer with dogs who have similar health problems. "She's even getting some of the same chemo drugs I get."

Brandon and Ram are one of six pen pal pairs in the Youth and Pets Survivors (YAPS) program, created by Ingalls and members of the Animal Care Foundation's Community Outreach Committee, a nonprofit organization of the Veterinary Referral Center of Denver. The program aims to help children learn more about their cancer and adjust to their illness, as well as give them a sympathetic and nonjudgmental soft, floppy ear.

"They will write in letters to the dogs things they would never tell another human being," Ingalls said.

The program began in November 2001, and Ingalls expects to have more matches in coming months. Children selected for the program receive a portfolio with pictures and biographies of dogs, and choose one to write to. Most of the canines are cancer survivors, although at least one in the program was born without a front leg and with dysfunctional hips, and spent the first year of her life in surgery or recovery.

The program works best with children aged 10 to 13, Ingalls said. They are old enough to read and write letters articulating their emotions, but young enough to enjoy the fantasy of a dog writing to them. Co-director Colleen Chambers, a veterinary technician at the referral center, recruits the dogs and their owners. Owners must commit themselves to writing letters in their dog's voice regularly. They must be emotionally prepared to handle a relationship with a child with cancer, as well as their dog's battle with the illness, Ingalls said.

Ingalls decided on the pen pal approach rather than face-to-face meetings because the dogs and kids come from all over the state. Getting them together would entail a logistical nightmare and many more people than her all-volunteer staff. Instead, they arranged a group meeting of dogs and kids in May at a dog festival called Bark in the Park. The group met in a special enclosure set up for them.

"It was just a riot," Ingalls said. Dogs and children immediately recognized each other from their pictures, and bonded quickly. They hugged, played and had their pictures taken together. The kids' parents talked to the dogs' owners. Some went out to lunch together after the gathering. Some now meet regularly at each other's houses or a halfway point, Ingalls said.

She would like to expand the program to other hospitals and animal care centers around the country. "The benefits have gone beyond anything I ever would have believed," she said. "The kids really get a kick out of the fact that a dog is going through the same thing they are."

Brandon's canine pen pal gives him hope, he told Ingalls. "If Ram can do it, I can do it, too." She also has brought him closer to his younger brother, 10-year-old Brett, who is pen pal to a springer spaniel named Max. Max's sister, Annie, lost a leg to cancer.

Max's experience "has helped me not to be so scared about Brandon," Brett told Ingalls. "I know that he is going to make it."