Dog can Sniff COLON CANCER
You might heard about the a study about dog can sniff prostate cancer. But there is a new discovery that a dog can also detect colon cancer by simply sniffing people's breath or stool. But not all dogs, a specially trained dogs can only do that according to a new study.
Japanese scientists discovered a Labrador Retriever could detect a chemical produced by cancer cells just by smelling humans breath even in the early stages of the disease, and almost as accurate as a colonoscopy. In the study, researchers at Kyushu University used Marine, an eight-year-old Labrador. Marine completed 74 sniff tests, consisting of sniffing five breath or stool samples at a time in which one was cancerous, over a period of months. The samples came from 48 people with confirmed colorectal cancer and 258 volunteers with no cancer. Half of the comparison samples came from people with bowel polyps, which are benign growths that are thought to be a precursor of colorectal cancer.
Believe it or not, the dog correctly identified the cancerous samples in 33 out of 36 of the breath tests and 37 of 38 stool tests.
The researchers even complicated the task for Marine by adding a few challenges to the samples, including samples from smokers or from subjects with other types of gut problems which might have masked or interfered with other smells, but these did not interfere with the dog's olfactory accuracy.
An inexpensive, more accurate test to detect bowel cancer early could help in the fight against the disease, but don't expect dogs to take the place of colorectal cancer test. Besides, it is difficult to introduce canine scent judgement into clinical practice owing to the expensive and time required for the dog trainer and for dog education.
The study shows that cancer cells give off specific discernible odours as they circulate through the body. If the specific chemicals that produce the smell of colorectal cancer are identified, a sensor could be substituted for dog instead.
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