We knew that dog flair was effective in detecting narcotics. Less than sniffer dogs were found to be just as useful in screening for cancer.
German researchers have found that dogs can tell if they have lung cancer by identifying the breath of people with the disease, says the study in the European respiratory journal. To achieve these results, dogs trained for this purpose sniffed 220 volunteer patients, some of whom had lung cancer. In the end, they correctly identified the 71 samples corresponding to patients with lung cancer. The experiment was also conclusive when it came to identifying samples from healthy volunteers.
This feat suggests that the dog’s flair would be able to distinguish “healthy” breath from the breath of a sick patient.
Canine flair for screening for other cancers
This is not the first time that canine scent has been used to detect the scent of cancer. Several medical studies had shown the effectiveness of the method. In 2004, a British study published in the British Medical Journal revealed that trained dogs were able to detect bladder cancer from urine samples.
In addition, last January, we announced the first dogs trained in France to detect cancer. A Malinois shepherd had been trained by the French Air Force were for specially sniffing prostate cancer.
