Pet-Agree, LLC

We have all heard of service dogs that assist their human companions who have visual, hearing, or physical disabilities.  These dogs on duty work hard every day to help their human’s eyes ‘see’, ears ‘hear’ and assist with day to day activities that many of us take for granted.  That is just the beginning of what dogs these days are doing.  With their keen sense of smell and intuition, an ambitious dog’s list of possible employment opportunities continues to grow.

Did you know that dogs have been trained to smell out cancer?  The first dog to ever be trained to smell out malignant melanomas was a Schnauzer named George.   George had started his sniffing career smelling out explosives until Dr. Armand Cognetta (a dermatologist) had an idea.  Why not train dogs to smell out malignant melanomas?  Dr. Cognetta began working with George and had great success.  Doctors only diagnose about 80% of melanomas.  George, on the other hand, correctly diagnosed melanomas over 99% of the time.  Watch out doc, your profession is going to the dogs!

Just because your dog hasn’t been trained to smell out melanomas does not mean you should ignore his sense of smell.  In 1989, well before George’s training, a woman reported that her half Border Collie half Doberman kept sniffing at a mole on her leg.  The dog even went so far as to try and bite off the offending spot.  The woman went to the doctor and learned that the mole was a malignant melanoma.  The dog may have saved her life.

Perhaps your dog isn’t into skin.  That’s fine, there are other opportunities for your pooches’ highly skilled sniffer.  No one is sure how, but dogs have been able to detect a seizure before they occur.  Once again, no training necessary.  In fact, for this profession it would appear that either the dog has ‘the sense’ or doesn’t.  If a dog ‘has it’ they can be further trained to perfect their ability and help them communicate with their person.  If your dog doesn’t have it, well, there is no training him to learn it.  For now, training consists of recognizing the ability in the dog and then encouraging the behavior.  What are the dogs sensing?  If we knew, we could train it.  There are a couple of theories.  One theory is that the person has a certain body language before a seizure that the dog picks up on.   Another theory is that the dog can smell a change in the person’s chemistry before the seizure occurs.  Either way, the dog senses the ‘change’ indicating an upcoming seizure and tries to alert the person.  This ‘alert’ could be as simple as a lick on the hand.

I have mentioned in a previous blog how my beloved Miniature Schnauzer Maggie sensed my pregnancies long before I had any idea.  What I have not mentioned is her quirky behavior in regards to my diabetes.  I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in Maggie’s lifetime.  Apparently Maggie can tell the difference in my ‘smell’ when my blood sugar levels are off.  I am being totally honest when I tell you that Maggie has woken me up in the night multiple times to alert me to a low blood sugar (a potentially life threatening event) that I was not sensing myself.  Did I mention that she sleeps in the other room?  Pretty amazing.

Maggie isn’t the only sugar smelling pooch.  Mark Ruefenacht, a forensic scientist from California, trains hypoglycemic alert dogs.  He uses Labrador Retrievers that have flunked out of guide dog school.  In as little as 3-4 months of training these dogs can sense a low blood sugar and alert their person- potentially saving their life.  Some dogs have even been known to pick up on a dropping blood sugar level and been able to alert their person before the hypoglycemia occurs.  Dogs that have received training are accurate 90% of the time.  That is much more accurate than my continuous glucose monitor!  Too bad Ruefenacht is only training Labradors now, I would send Maggie to him to fine tune her skill.

We are only just beginning to explore all the things dogs can help us with.  From fetching the paper to saving your life, a dogs’ job is hardly limited to couch warmer these days.  The next time your dog is acting strangely towards you, pay attention.  It might not just be a new quirk.  Your pet could be trying to tell you something.  After all, dogs are man’s best friend.  Plus, if anything happens to you who would feed Fido?

*http://siriusdog.com/melanoma-mole-dog-detect.htm

* http://www.deltasociety.org/Document.Doc?id=227

* http://www.dogs4diabetics.com/news/articles/wash-post-022008.html