Nurse's Best Friend: How 10 Minutes With a Therapy Dog Helps Nurses Fight Stress and Burnout

New Adelphi-led research shows how brief visits with a service dog during hospital shifts helps nurses refocus, refuel and get back to patient care.

Pet owners know that even the longest, most stressful day can turn around as soon as we come home to the unconditional love of an animal. For nurses, who regularly spend long, stressful days working in life-or-death settings, those creature comforts can carry even more meaning.

Joy Scharfman '78, PhD '23, assistant professor in Adelphi's College of Nursing and Public Health, and Valerie A. Esposito Kubanick '01, MS '05, PhD '23, assistant professor in the Nursing Department at CUNY York College, who both earned their nursing doctorates from Adelphi in 2023, have firsthand knowledge of the immense burdens that nurses shoulder-and the immediate relief that animals can offer. In their new paper, "Nurses' Best Friend? The Lived Experiences of Nurses Who Utilized Dog Therapy in the Workplace" (Nursing Reports, July 2025), Drs. Scharfman and Esposito Kubanick share results from a study that tested the effects of dog therapy on nurses' energy, self-care and stress management.

The idea for the study grew out of Dr. Esposito Kubanick's volunteer work, which involved bringing her own service dog to a local hospital for patient visits. "The patients loved it," she said, "but the nurses would also stop us in the hall and ask to pet the dog." When she noticed that nurses from more intensive care units were wanting more time with the dog, her researcher instincts kicked in.

Dr. Esposito Kubanick connected with Dr. Scharfman, proposing they dig deeper. They found few studies on the benefits of healthcare professionals working with emotional support animals (ESAs), and even fewer that focused specifically on nurses. Despite this gap in the scholarship, Dr. Esposito Kubanick says they could "see that the nurses really needed what a service animal could offer."

The two designed a study small enough to foreground qualitative observations and interviews. Every week for three months, 11 hospital nurses volunteered for several 10-minute-long, one-to-one visits with Rex, a certified service dog for anxiety, depression and PTSD and a registered ESA, during their shifts. Once the study ended, the nurses were asked to describe how they were feeling before, during and after their visits with Rex.

It was clear that time with Rex was incredibly meaningful to all participants. "One nurse coming directly from the ER didn't even say hello, just walked in the room and got on the floor for the whole 10 minutes, crying with the dog," Dr. Esposito Kubanick recalled. "At the end, she stood up, straightened herself out and said to me, 'I can go back to work now. I have a patient who's about to die, and I need to take care of that.'"

The participants ended up voicing four major themes in their reports: the anxiety related to possible "unknowns" in each shift; the stress and exhaustion of doing the work during a shift; the necessity of "refueling and re-setting" throughout the day; and the healthcare system's neglect of stress and burnout among nurses.

Drs. Scharfman and Esposito Kubanick found that access to Rex-a supportive, loving companion-intersected with all four themes. "The nurses would tell us that seeing the dog, or even the thought of seeing him, could change their whole day and how they felt," Dr. Scharfman said. "If they had a patient who was very sick, or dying, it would help them get refocused and be able to go back to work with new energy after just 10 minutes, sometimes less."

The two are already expanding on the foundational research of their paper. They now have nine service dogs registered for a new study, along with a dedicated hospital room where nurses (and any other workers) can drop in without an appointment to play with the dogs.

For today's nurses, high stress levels can have an impact on the quality and safety of care they provide. Burnout is a persistent problem in the field, one which the healthcare system is scrambling to deal with. Yet "access to service animals during a shift could be part of the self-care which nurses need to stay in the field," Dr. Scharfman said. And, as the paper notes, helping nurses cope with job stress is critical in preserving the health of the profession-and the entire world.

Frequently Asked Questions

How was the dog therapy study conducted?

For three months, 11 hospital nurses volunteered for several 10-minute, one-on-one visits each week with Rex during their shifts. Rex is a service dog certified for anxiety, depression and PTSD, and a registered emotional support animal (ESA). After the study, the nurses described how they felt before, during and after their visits.

What is the optimal length of a therapy dog visit to help nurses?

In the study, nurses said that 10 minutes with the dog-and sometimes less-was enough to help them refocus and go back to work with new energy. This held even when nurses were caring for very sick or dying patients.

Why does nurse burnout matter for patients?

High stress can affect the quality and safety of the care nurses provide, and burnout is a persistent problem across the profession. Drs. Scharfman and Esposito Kubanick argue that helping nurses cope with job stress is critical to preserving the health of the profession.

Could service animals help keep nurses in the profession?

The researchers believe so. Dr. Scharfman said that "access to service animals during a shift could be part of the self-care which nurses need to stay in the field."