ReCHAI Community Programs

PALS for Seniors
PALS for Seniors is an innovative, online certification program, to enable people and their pets (dogs) to become certified to do pet therapy with older adults who live in the community and in care facilities. This online environment provides the curriculum, training materials, a message discussion board, and a library of relevant materials for those who register with our program.

PAWSitive Visits
An animal visitation program for older adults in which nursing home and retirement facility residents learn about and interact with a variety of animals. This activity provides the participants with an animal to hold, hug and touch as well as entertainment and mental stimulation of recalling memories about animal experiences in their lives.

TigerPlace
TigerPlace is a 32-apartment, pet-encouraging retirement housing facility built by Americare Systems, Inc. in collaboration with the MU Sinclair School of Nursing. Pet-friendly design features include screened porches, outside doors for each apartment, wide windowsills, tile floors in entryways, walk trails, and the TigerPlace Pet Initiative. The veterinary exam room allows resident pets to be treated within TigerPlace, a great convenience for the older adult pet owners.

TigerPlace Pet Initiative (TiPPI)
TiPPI is a cross-disciplinary, collaborative program between the MU Sinclair School of Nursing and the MU College of Veterinary Medicine. The underlying principle of TiPPI is the belief in the health benefits of human animal interaction and the human animal bond for older adults and pets. This belief is based on research showing that older adults live longer, healthier and happier lives when they own or regularly interact with pets.

TiPPI aims to:

• Foster a pet-encouraging environment in TigerPlace, an "aging in place" residential facility. This includes the “PAWsitive Visits” program in which different animals are brought to TigerPlace weekly for residents to learn about and interact with.
• Facilitate excellent veterinary care of TigerPlace residents' pets, while simultaneously providing an invaluable learning experience for veterinary students to work with older adult clients. The fully-equipped veterinary exam room enables residents to simply walk their animal down the hall to see a veterinarian. A faculty clinician works with veterinary students to provide care to pet residents of TigerPlace.
• Promote research into the benefits of human animal interaction and the human animal bond.
• Provide foster care and adoption services for bereaved pets of TigerPlace when their owners are deceased or can no longer care for them; we support the pet's care in a foster home with another TigerPlace resident, or if this is not possible, in a foster home in the community until permanent adoption takes place.