We have a patient who wants to bring her dog with her to her appointments. One of our employees is deathly afraid of dogs and another employee is allergic to dogs. Can we refuse to have a dog on our premises?

If the dog is a pet, the answer is yes. If your business is open to the public and the dog is a service animal, however, you must allow the animal on your premises. Fear of an animal or allergies to animals is not generally a valid basis for refusing entry to a service animal. Individuals with a disability have legal rights to access public places with service dogs.

Service animals are animals that are individually trained to perform tasks for people with disabilities—such as guiding people who are blind, alerting people who are deaf, pulling wheelchairs, alerting and protecting a person who is having a seizure, or performing other