Can dogs detect the smell of cancer?

Any thoughts from bladder cancer patients who have to have regular cystoscopies often with irritation and sometimes infection. Give me the “dog test” anytime,
Comfort,economy and less chance of infection and scarring.Having nursed for 50 and more years and now,personally,with B.C. I think I can claim some inside knowledge.
Yours etc.,
George

i think that the trials are great but in 90% of cases that were studied, the dog did not know the person! i believe dogs have have this ability to know when their owners DEVELOPE cancer rather than have it. their sense of smell is so great that they sense a change if we develope cancer. response please!

I find the subject interesting but understand there are probably practical difficulties that would need to be overcome before using dogs to detect cancer could become more widespread. It may be that they can detect some cancers more easily than others, but any dog can have an off day and cancer detection is too important to be left with something that isn’t as reliable as possible. I say ‘as possible’ as I don’t think any detection means can ever be 100%.

But it’s an interesting field of study and shows us how valuable dogs can be to humans. I’ve also read of cats that can detect cancer, though the accounts I read about were anecdotal, ie from the cats’ owners. I imagine that cats wouldn’t be trainable in the same way as dogs; if a cat doesn’t want to bother doing something all the rewards in the world won’t make it! We hear of ‘working dogs’, but who ever heard of a ‘working cat’?

Anyhow, I’m glad the dogs and their abilities are getting publicity and I hope in future they can be trained to help even further in the fight against this horrible disease.

What a negative article, I know that my mothers dog was right about her cancer and of equal importance to me (at least) my fathers prostate cancer. What would be wrong in funding research into this area as you my find there is some value.
By the way I have a hypo alert dog which I know has saved my life. Cancer research has now lost my support and I will put my hard earned pennies to a more open cause, maybe mor people should withdraw support from what appears to be am organisation not open to all possible answers.

I beleive that dogs may be able to smell it. But at what point when a dog sniffs you do you think oh no this may be cancer he is picking up on?

Jemima,

With regard to prostate cancer, Cancer Research UK scientists have been working on a way to detect specific proteins (called MCM proteins) in urine and other fluid samples, which we hope will lead to an automated, reliable way to diagnose prostate and bladder cancer. See
http://cancerhelp.cancerresearchuk.org/about-cancer/cancer-questions/where-can-i-get-the-new-urine-test-for-bladder-cancer

There is a significant body of evidence to show that automated tests for specific proteins will lead to effective diagnostics for cancer in the future (for example, follow some of the links to PubMed, the medical publications database in the original post).

Weighed against that, there are two papers suggesting that a handful of dogs can detect cancer under certain conditions, and there’s one paper to show they don’t. And this still doesn’t take into account the significant practical and welfare issues involved in using dogs in a medical setting.

Cancer Research UK will only fund world-class science, where there is evidence to suggest that the research will lead to effective new ways to diagnose, treat and prevent cancer.

We give out funding based on grant applications by researchers – we do not “commission” research. If a UK scientist was to make an application to our science funding committee to undertake a project testing dogs for diagnosing cancer, it would be scrutinised by a panel of expert scientists, as all our grant applications are.

If the science was felt to be of high enough calibre, and fitted with our strategic objectives, then the grant would be funded. But, to the best of our knowledge, we have never received any such applications for funding.

Kat

I would not ever doubt this but hopefully more research in this area is put forth.

The McCulloch study showed dogs were 90 per cent accurate in two different types of cancer. It might turn out that there are other explanations for the success, but I think it’s interesting enough to pursue.

Let’s take prostrate cancer. Current method of diagnosis? Not that nice. If dogs were able to detect via urine or prostatic fluid or even breath exhalate (as was used in the McCulloch study), i.e. non-invasively, that would be incredibly useful. And you would not have to rely on one dog on one day for diagnosis – it would be perfectly possible to run several dogs by an individual sample.

All I’m arguing is that it should be investigated further for the lessons that could be learned from dogs. I’m not saying this as a “dog person” blinded by their wonderfulness – I’m saying it because I think the preliminary evidence warrants it.

By fuzzy logic I mean that dogs may be able to reason/assess in a way that an e-nose may not – to detect a pattern that might be variable. There is some evidence that they can do this from the drugs/explosive work.

I think it is particularly interesting, for instance, that dogs have been taught to alert over a specific threshold (as with the currency dogs used by Customs + Excise).

Of course I can see the problems. But, equally, I still think this should have some proper money thrown at it and be explored properly. Cancer Research is in a unique position to do so, it would not take very much money and I’d wager that it would be a particularly effective PR tool for CR.

It would make a terrific follow-up film, too – a real opportunity to educate about the scientific method.

Jemima

Jemima

Yes, absolutely dogs and smell cancer (in particular skin cancer) this has been known about for years.

Here’s some helpful YouTube video links about this:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=&search_query=dog+detect+cancer&aq=f

-Scott

Thanks Jemima. You’re absolutely right – dogs have been invaluable to humankind over the ages. And nobody would doubt their incredible abilities in finding bombs or drugs, guiding the blind or just generally being a good buddy. But we should be mindful of stretching that admiration too far (and I say that as a ‘dog’ person by the way).

As we pointed out in the post, the studies on dogs have been small, and although more accurate than pure chance, are still not accurate enough to be a good basis for cancer screening – not to mention all the practical problems of using dogs in a hospital setting for cancer detection. Also, you are confusing the mathematical and computing term “fuzzy logic” [see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzzy_logic] with inaccuracy.

Just because dogs are not 100% accurate at detecting cancer samples does not mean that they are using fuzzy logic. It means that they are not accurate – and that is the most serious problem. I love dogs but I wouldn’t want to risk my own cancer diagnosis because Rover was having an ‘off’ day, fancied a bone, spotted a cat or really needed a run in the park.

As raised in the article, there is plenty of research going on around the world into the kinds of volatile chemicals that are given off by tumours, and development of machines that can use them to reliably and accurately detect cancer – the basis of any successful screening programme or diagnostic.

Cancer Research UK is investing in research into biomarkers – molecular “clues” to cancer that will enable us to do just that.

Kat

Jemima Harrison says that “There is no doubting the impressiveness of the Willis and McCulloch studies”. While there is no doubting that some dogs are able to detect something, some of the time, I don’t think that a test which only has a 41% accuracy rate (in other words, is wrong more often that it’s right) can really be described as “impressive”.

She also says that “there is no electronic nose that can replicate the dog’s fuzzy logic”. And yet the links provided in the article show that electonic noses have demonstrated accuracy levels of over 90% – way above what any dog has been shown to be capable of.

I’d love the idea of replacing mammograms with spanielgrams and laparoscopies with labradoroscopies, but sadly, I don’t think it’s going to happen.

I am disappointed to see Cancer Research still taking such a sceptical view of dogs’ potential ability to detect cancer. There is no doubting the impressiveness of the Willis and McCulloch studies. And there is as yet no electronic nose that can replicate the dog’s fuzzy logic. No one is suggesting that it is very practical to use dogs as diagnositc tools at the end of the day, although I dont really see why not – after all we train and trust dogs to make life and death decisions for us in other areas such as bomb detection. At the very LEAST Cancer Research should be funding research into working out what it is the dogs in the successful studies are detecting – and/or perhaps finding the small amount of money that would be necessary for a larger, more definitive study.

Jemima Harrison
Producer/Director
“Can Dogs Smell Cancer?”

Let assume that dogs can smell it, but they can not tell it, at the end we need to rely on difference diagnostic methods. This may be interesting to find how dogs can smell cancer or what is the mechanism behind it.