QA Hospital volunteer duo prove animal therapy is the best kind

Eighty-year-old Frankie North and her sidekick, eight-year old Clara, a blue merle collie, have been volunteering at Queen Alexandra Hospital, Cosham, for almost eight years as Clara approaches her ninth birthday.

Frankie, who has lived at Steep, near Petersfield, for 24 years, says: ‘It’s payback time for QA, they've been so good to my family over the years. We’ve needed that hospital.

‘For myself, for my husband and for my son, who came for the weekend and stayed for six months after he had a massive stroke. He was only 45.’

Frankie sees her and Clara’s seven, nearly eight, year-long bout of volunteering for the hospital once every week as their way of giving back after years of care for her nearest and dearest, writes Elsa Waterfield.

‘They kept him in and he was in there for three months during rehab, they were excellent,’ she adds.

Frankie enrolled the now revered Clara when she was just a year old on a programme known as Pets as Therapy, which operates at QA and soon hopes to have up to nine therapy dogs working with patients.

‘I think Clara’s the old lady out of all of them now, she’s the one that’s been doing it the longest.

‘My husband is a patient there at the moment in oncology, I've bounced in and out of there myself in the last couple of years two or three times. We’re lucky,’ she says.

‘People don’t really appreciate it, it’s not a lot what we do but just to be able to give a little bit back.’

Pets As Therapy (PAT) is a national charity that aims to improve the health and wellbeing of patients, allowing them to access the companionship of an animal.

‘There are times when you’re with patients who really are very poorly, you feel it is a privilege – if you think you can give five minutes of your time and that’s going to make them feel better, it’s worth it isn’t it?’ says Frankie.

‘We get a lot out of it as well. You get a feelgood factor and, in some cases, you think how fortunate you are.’

Clara is now an undoubtedly valued member of the team at QA and spends time with patients receiving end-of-life care, offering comfort to hundreds of people over the years.

‘She’s got the knack - I mean most dogs do - of making people feel like they're the only person they like,’ she laughs.

‘Which is a nice feeling to have.’

Frankie recalls one particular occasion which led to a nomination from a bystander for the Pride of Portsmouth Awards in 2019, and subsequently Frankie won the volunteer of the year award.

‘She was with a patient, who through no fault of their own had no family or people to visit, she was on an end-of-life ward and she was very anxious and so Clara lay by her bed and supported her.’

‘She died very peacefully soon afterwards,’ adds Frankie.

Clara’s compassionate instincts and knack for the job were first noticed by Frankie’s daughter on a walk in Petersfield town centre when Clara was just a puppy.

‘It was my daughter who came back and said to me “you really should pursue [PAT]”.

‘She had spotted a young man in a wheelchair and just walked straight up to him and put her head in his lap, even as a puppy,’ says Frankie.

‘Then I started to think about it, she showed all the right tendencies.’

Volunteers with PAT are temperament-assessed and the placid and affectionate Clara was soon accepted into the programme and making visits to patients at QA.

‘They have to really have a little bit of empathy about them and then after that it’s just training them to behave themselves - same as you do with your children!’

‘Kill each other indoors but not outside,’ laughs Frankie.

While Clara laps up the attention off shift, as soon as she steps on the ward she slips effortlessly into her role, one which Frankie says she enjoys just as much as the patients.

‘She’s needy, she’s a needy dog and she loves nothing more than to snuggle up to someone,’ says Frankie.

‘After her first stint it was fairly obvious she was perfect for it, she’s a lunatic at home, but as soon as she has the tabard on she knows exactly where she is and exactly what she’s there for.

‘It’s unbelievable how she can be two different dogs.’

While Pets As Therapy is her most recent charitable exploit, it is not Frankie’s first experience when it comes to helping animals make a difference.

‘It’s pretty amazing how things can change when a child comes into contact with an animal,’ she says.

‘I've done over 30 years with riding for the disabled, so I do know the change they can make.’

The Riding for the Disabled Association (RDA) is a charity allowing horses to benefit the lives of disabled children and adults, using riding as a form of therapy.

‘Obviously they've got to have a certain temperament, but they know when they’ve got a child with special needs, they sense it, they’re quite precious actually.

Frankie saw first-hand the therapeutic and health benefits that interaction between horses and people with a range of physical and learning disabilities and autism could have, from confidence, communication and physical ability.

‘For some children, it makes them,’ she says.

‘They can be uncommunicative but when you put them on top of the pony, they become communicative, with the animal more than with the human.’

Frankie first got involved with rescuing horses or ‘carrot councillors’ after her three children left home and she found herself at a loss with what to do with her time.

‘I’ve never been a person who can just do nothing. I started RDA when I had an empty nest, we all suffer with it,’ she says.

‘You’ve got to pick and choose what suits you and the thing that suits me is animals – anything to do with animals.’

Frankie moved from Kingston, London, and soon caught the rescue bug – having owned and rescued more animals than she can keep count of.

‘I brought a couple of horses down with me from Kingston and after that, if something needed a home, I was on the end of the phone.’

Aside from those she helped through RDA, Frankie herself misses the support of a non-judgemental, listening ear offered by her horses – the last of which she lost four years ago.

‘If you’ve got any stress in your life, I used to call them my carrot councillors, they stand there listening to you when you’re balling your eyes out,’ she says.

‘You can go out, give them a hug, tell them what's what. There’s been times when I’ve had things I’ve had to deal with like anybody does, I’ve gone out and spent a bit of time with them and you feel better!’

While her life caring for and with animals has been hard work and, a lot of the time, costly, Frankie doesn’t regret it for ‘one minute’.

‘I think you’re lucky to have the disposition where you feel you can talk to an animal. Some people just don’t like them but I'm afraid – with me – it’s like me, like my dog!