A shelter dog made quite an impression at an adoption event in Virginia this month—she's credited with alerting a man she'd never seen before that he was about to have a seizure. Sienna, a 3-year-old lab and pit bull mix with no known training in detecting seizures, was moving between booths at a church yard sale on June 7 when she pulled Jackie Poppe, a volunteer with Friends of Campbell County Animal Control, toward a very tall man, "which is not normal for her," Poppe tells the Washington Post.
Sienna—rescued as a stray on the streets of Altavista, per WDBJ—walked right up to Josh Davis, who is 6'9", and put her paw on his leg. It was at that point that Davis' wife realized her husband, who has epilepsy, looked like he might have a seizure. He'd forgotten to take his medication that morning. Though Davis has a vagus nerve stimulator (VNS) implanted in his chest, seizures can still happen. With Sienna's prompting, he went to his home around the corner from the church and relaxed.
"If he hadn't calmed down ... even with the VNS, he was very likely to have a full-on convulsion seizure," his wife, Kristen, tells the Post. Davis says he was ready to take Sienna home right then, but the couple already have three dogs and are unable to care for a fourth. No matter: The shelter received a flood of adoption requests after revealing Sienna's skill. However, Sienna ultimately went to a Roanoke woman who filed an application before the seizure alert, yet happens to have a son with epilepsy. Sienna hasn't left the son's side since arriving June 13, the Post reports. (More uplifting news stories.)
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