There's a new development in the fight against cancer. A study from Germany says dogs can detect lung cancer in humans with amazing accuracy.
The study says the dogs were able to correctly sniff out cancer from breath samples 71 percent of the time. That's as good as most imaging tests, according to WebMd.com.
That comes as no surprise to Jimmie Blackburn of Loris. "I don't think there's nothing a dog can't do," Blackburn said.
Blackburn has congestive heart problems and sometimes his heart will go out of rhythm in the middle of the night. When that happens, Daisy, his 11-year-old Dachshund, is trained to wake him up.
"What she does is, she takes her nose and she puts it underneath mine," Blackburn said. "If she doesn't feel air, they got her trained to lick me in the face. If I still don't wake up, they got her trained to bounce up and down on my chest."
If all that doesn't work, Daisy is even trained to press a lifeline button hanging around Blackburn's neck to summon an ambulance.
A Myrtle Beach oncologist said the study about cancer detection by dogs is interesting, but more research is needed.
"Any anecdotal reports like this need to be tested in a clinical study and in a study to confirm the efficacy of the dogs being able to detect the cancer early on," said Dr. Patrick Francke, of Carolina Regional Cancer Center.
Dr. Francke said other reports over the years have shown that dogs can also detect colon cancer. Those studies come as good news in the fight against cancer, Dr. Francke said, because any new screening tools would certainly be welcome.
"Pretty much across the board the earlier a cancer is found, the earlier the stage, and the better the prognosis, the more successful the treatment."
Francke said what the cancer sniffing dogs are doing is sensing certain chemicals in a patient's breath in miniscule portions. That could lead to developing devices that can mimic what a dog can do.
"If we can find out what those chemicals are and come up with detecting those chemicals at a very early point like dogs can, then that's what the dogs are actually teaching us."
Francke doesn't expect to see dogs used as screening tools any time soon, but when it does happen, he thinks his own yellow lab retriever, Maggie, might be a good candidate.
"She sleeps about 20 hours a day so anything that would put her to work would be welcome," Francke said.
