Psychometric assessments
Before the first clinical examination, the parent‐reported CFSS‐DS scores ranged between 20 and 53 (mean 33, standard deviation [SD] 9). New baseline scores before the clinical examination at the second visit differed slightly for the cohort that had undergone clinical examination in the presence of the therapy dog (mean 36 [SD 10]) versus the second cohort of children about to meet the therapy dog for the first time (mean 28 [SD 8]) (Figure The divergence also appears in the CFSS‐DS short version scores. The cohort that had the therapy dog present during the clinical examination on the first visit reported scores between 5 and 12 after the clinical examination on the second visit (mean 7 [SD 2]). In contrast, the scores in the cohort that did not meet the therapy dog at the clinical examination on their first visit were all “5,” that is, not afraid at all.Interestingly, the same tendency is also reflected in the child‐reported happy‐sad‐face scores. that is, the mean scores of 2.3 and 3.2 at baseline before the first clinical examination jumped to 2.8 and 3.0 before the examination on the second visit in the cohort that had undergone the clinical examination on the first visit in the therapy dog's presence. In contrast, the values dropped to 1.0 and 1.3 in the cohort of children about to meet the therapy dog for the first time (Figure 