How a dog's natural instincts save a woman with epilepsy – USA TODAY

An Indiana woman with epilepsy credits her dog’s natural instincts with regularly protecting her from danger when she has seizures.
“When I went to fall, he gets underneath of my arms to lower me down,” says Tina Stikeleather, 44. “He did that himself the first time he ever did that. I didn’t teach him that.”
Stikeleather caught a startling moment on camera where her dog did just that. She had set up her phone to record what was supposed to be a TikTok training exercise for her German Shepherd, Max. Instead, she captured the minutes right before having an actual seizure in her kitchen and how Max tries to warn her by climbing up onto the sink where she’s standing.
“When I told him to get down, he didn’t take my cue to get down. He went to the other side, got back up and then I was thinking, ‘OK, there’s something,'” said Stikeleather.
Watch how Max not only warns his owner about an impending seizure in the video above, but protects her from injury when she falls.
She says Max can often sense a seizure coming on even before she can and guards against potential hazards she faces because of her condition. He’ll watch over when she takes a bath, for example, and stays by her side when she gets migraines or isn’t feeling well.
“He watches so closely that he picks up on if I’m sitting and I start rubbing my head because my head’s really hurting or I bend over,” she said. “He’s already up and over to me.”
Ever since he was a puppy, she says Max has been extremely intuitive. He has not received professional service dog training but has learned how to support her through various basic commands.
According to the Epilepsy Foundation, seizure dogs can be trained to alert family members, offer comfort, and lie next to a person having a seizure as a form of protection. 
Amazing Tails, a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit that’s been training different breeds of dogs for more than 20 years to detect seizures, says some dogs just have the right personality for it.
“It’s typically dogs that are busy,” said Leslie Wheeler, a trainer at Amazing Tails with more than ten years of experience. “They’re constantly on the lookout. They’re constantly on the alert. They’re hyper-vigilant dogs.”
The organization says more people are starting to realize how valuable canine sensibilities can be to health care. Seizure alert dogs, for example, can sense an oncoming seizure up to 15 minutes prior to when it happens. Executive Director Joan Bussard says more research still needs to be done, but it’s possible dogs can latch onto a scent that humans can’t smell.
“Before the seizure manifests for a person, there will be a change in the brain,” said Bussard. “That electrical change will emit a hormone that will emit an odor. Dogs smell it. Their sense of smell is 200 times greater than ours.”
Stikeleather says Max definitely fits the description of an attentive and observant dog. The popularity of the video, which now has more than 16 million views and counting, has helped connect her with others who have epilepsy and are also struggling with health issues.
“If it can bring awareness or help even one person, you know, it’s worth it,” said Stikeleather.

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