TO BE OF SERVICE

TO BE OF SERVICE is a feature-length documentary film about war veterans suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder ( PTSD) who are paired with a service dog to help them regain their lives. These vets' experience of returning home is often wrought with depression and a wrenching disconnect from the world they once inhabited. Family, old friends and jobs seem foreign and the newly returned men and women struggle to function and return to a civilian normal.

Since Viet Nam, the VA has worked to develop treatment programs for vets suffering from PTSD including therapy and medications, but as yet there is no universally effective protocol. The VA has engaged in a multi-year study into the use of service dogs for PTSD but they have not announced their conclusions and continue to deny funding them as a treatment for PTSD. It’s only through extraordinary personal effort and scholarship programs, that thousands of vets have been paired with trained service dogs and the outcomes have been life changing.