10 Market Square
Hayle
Cornwall
TR27 4HE

The only specialist national charity for people in their last years and their much loved, much needed companion animals.

A network of 15,000 volunteers “hold hands” with owners to provide vital loving care for their pets. We keep them together - for example, we’ll walk a dog every day for a housebound owner, we’ll foster pets when owners need hospital care, we’ll fetch the cat food, or even clean out the bird cage, etc.

Companion animals and the elderly

When staying at home is no longer an option, our Pet Friendly Care Home Register lists care homes and retirement housing happy to accept residents with pets, and providing previous arrangements have been made with us we will take on life time care of a bereaved pet.

It is widely acknowledged that pets can positively benefit the well-being of elderly owners. For many elderly people living on their own, their pets are their reason for living. They are constant companions - on hand 24 hours a day, every day, comforting, loving and protecting their owners - not only from outside threats, but also offering the more subtle form of protection from loneliness and despair.

Pets are warm and intensely loyal. They do not criticise, they boost morale, they help reduce stress by providing emotional security, and they help to provide a fixed routine. Pets have the ability to bring happiness and laughter and lift depression. Communication with other people is often easier when a pet is present for reassurance.

The special relationship between owner and pet adds incalculably to the quality of life, but all the pleasures and benefits can be completely neutralised by intense anxiety regarding the fate of their devoted companion should the owner die, fall ill, or have to move to residential accommodation. If an ‘old faithful’ dies, elderly owners are often very reluctant to have another pet for these reasons, and life for them loses much of its warmth, light and purpose.