A Different Kind of White Coat

From the day Betty Walsh brought Kolya home as a fuzzy ball of puppyhood four years ago, “he collected people everywhere he went,” says the school arts administrator. Kolya, a Great Pyrenees who now weighs 145 pounds, is sometimes mistaken for a polar bear by children. For the last 2 1/2 years, Kolya and Walsh have been one of 25 dog-owner volunteer teams that visit patients through the pet-assisted therapy program at Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center. We spent a recent Friday morning on rounds.

10:15 a.m. Leashed and accompanied by Walsh, Kolya heads for the elevator and the eighth floor.

10:23 Outside Room 819, the family of 83-year-old chemotherapy patient Ayers McGrew stares as Kolya approaches. Kolya pads into the room and Walsh sprays disinfectant on McGrew’s hand. She invites McGrew, who is legally blind, to pet him. “He’s as big as you are,” someone tells the patient, and McGrew smiles.

10:28 Surgery patient David Bonaparte, 31, is strolling the hall attached to his IV when he sees Kolya. “What kind of car do you lug him around in?” he asks Walsh (a Toyota Previa). A woman being wheeled down the hall on a gurney spies Kolya. “Can I pet your dog?” she asks.

10:40 In Room 700, on the seventh floor, Kolya plops onto the bed of Sabrina Foster, 82, who recently weighed in at 100 pounds. “He’s all yours,” Betty cracks, and pretends to leave. One of Foster’s roommates whispers, “I don’t think dogs should be in hospitals.”

10:54 In Room 710, Sarah Wald, 83, has seen Kolya before and welcomes him back with a pat. Kolya climbs atop the bed of Wald’s roommate, Ruth Pearson, 93. “He’s going to sleep with me,” Pearson laughs. Wald takes a phone call from her son, and tries to hustle him off the line. “There are a lot of people here,” she says, “and that big white dog.”

11:13 Marlene and Randy Sakamoto of Torrance are in the fourth-floor surgical waiting room during his mother’s open-heart surgery. Using their own camera, the Sakamotos get a picture of themselves with Kolya.

11:40 In the pediatric unit, Room 3120, Ezio Cecchini, 18 months, cries as his parents try to dress him in a hospital gown. Ezio’s father walks him to the hallway, where Ezio stops crying at the sight of Kolya. The wide-eyed boy stands beside Kolya, petting him and calling him a camel. When Kolya leaves, Ezio bursts out crying again.

11:50 Kolya and Walsh go outside for a comfort station stop.

11:52 Patients are scarce in the first-floor emergency department, and Kolya’s shift is declared over.