A recent landmark study proves the life-changing support that service dogs provide
Battle Ground, WA – (September 25th, 2025): Northwest Battle Buddies (NWBB), a nonprofit that provides service dogs to Veterans with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), is celebrating its 300th service dog team this Fall. Since 2012, Northwest Battle Buddies (NWBB) has been making a tremendous difference in the lives of Veterans with PTSD by using service dogs to help them overcome the debilitating symptoms of PTSD. Adding to the milestone, a study published in the Journal of Archives in Military Medicine (2025) proves these specially trained dogs provide a clinically significant reduction in PTSD symptoms. Sixty percent of the service dog teams used in the study were NWBB pairings — making the findings a direct reflection of the program’s impact.
“For many Veterans, a service dog is the difference between life and death,” says Shannon Walker, CEO and Founder, Northwest Battle Buddies. “This study confirms what we see every day as Veterans reclaim parts of themselves they thought they had lost forever. Reaching our 300th service dog graduation is a celebration of every life changed by these incredible canines.”
The results of this large-scale, peer-reviewed study with NWBB at the forefront represent one of the most rigorous evaluations to date examining the therapeutic role of psychiatric service dogs in managing PTSD. The findings include:
- Clinically significant reduction in PTSD symptoms
- Relief across all PTSD symptom categories
- Reduction in co-occurring depression
- Gains in resilience, life satisfaction, and emotional well-being
- Less isolation, more engagement
- Veteran perception of healing was overwhelmingly positive
NWBB service dogs’ skills include waking their Veteran from nightmares, interrupting anxiety attacks, redirecting flashbacks, alerting to adrenaline, providing a social barrier in public, performing pressure therapy, and offering a constant sense of safety. The service dogs spend five months in intensive training, followed by five additional weeks with their Veteran handler. Many service dogs are rescued from animal shelters.
Northwest Battle Buddies is a nonprofit organization that has been gifting professionally trained service dogs to American Veterans with PTSD since 2012, helping them regain their freedom, independence, and hope for the future. Learn more at northwestbattlebuddies.org.
