Eye Surgery Stress & Dog Therapy

“Any type of surgery-especially eye surgery such as cataract surgery can be stressful for patients,” commented Connecticut Cataract Surgeon Leslie Doctor, M.D. “Our staff and facility at the Wilton Surgery Center are really excellent at making cataract surgery patients feel relaxed and comfortable. Nonetheless I found a recent article in the journal Pain Medicine regarding how dog therapy can decrease emotional stress and promote a sense of well being pretty intriguing.”


Dog therapy and petting your dog before your cataract surgery might just find its way into the preoperative counseling given to cataract patients before their eye surgery, if recent reports from the 6th World Congress of the World Institute of Pain and published in Pain Medicine are any indication. By interacting with a dog and petting a dog there is actually a decrease in a whole host of biochemical markers including stress hormones along with increases in endorphin levels-both of which are long lasting after you have left the dog’s company.

“I know that the advanced cataract surgery procedures we use for our patients is geared to getting the best clinical results, as well as to help our cataract patients from all over Maine have an easy, quick and comfortable recovery from their cataract surgery,” noted Maine Cataract Surgeon Bruce Cassidy, M.D. of Eyecare Medical Group in Portland. “We are very attentive to making sure our preoperative medications really help cataract patients to be calm and relaxed. As a dog lover myself, I do appreciate the calming effect petting my dog has after a long day of cataract surgery.”