First ever NHS trial for cancer-sniffing dogs

The NHS has approved the first ever trial using specially trained dogs to sniff out prostate cancer.

Milton Keynes University Hospital is working with the charity Medical Detection Dogs on trials, after an initial study showed specially trained dogs can detect prostate tumours in urine in 93 per cent of cases.

Currently there are inaccuracies in the traditional Prostate-Specific Antigen (PSA) test, which are used to find out if men need a biopsy, with the test having a high ‘false positive’ rate resulting in many men being unnecessarily referred for an invasive procedure.

The PSA test for diagnosing prostate cancer is so unreliable that many GPs are reluctant to use it.

Iqbal Anjum, a consultant urologist at the hospital, said the study was “an extremely exciting prospect”.

He added: “Over the years there have been many anecdotal reports suggesting that dogs may be able to detect cancer based on the tumour’s odour. It is assumed that volatile molecules associated with the tumour would be released into the person’s urine, making samples easy to collect and test.”

The idea of using dogs to sniff out cancer came from the founder of Medical Detection Dogs, Dr Claire Guest, whose own dog Daisy made her realise she was suffering from breast cancer.

The normally gentle dog adamantly refused to get in the car, and began touching Dr Guest in the chest. Dr Guest realised the area where her dog was touching was bruised. She went for tests and found she had a benign tumour near the surface, and a deeper malignant growth, which could have been severe if it hadn’t been diagnosed early on.

Since 2002 she has been professionally involved in training dogs in the detection of human disease through scent and became the training director of the first programme in the world to train dogs to identify cancer by odour.

Her dog Daisy, which was trained by Medical Detection Dogs to sniff out cancer, was awarded the Blue Cross Medal for her pioneering work in the field of cancer detection, where she has sniffed over 6,500 samples and detected over 550 cases of cancer.

So far the only academic analysis of cancer sniffer dogs focused on one dog's ability to detect prostate cancer.

Now Medical Detection Dogs is working with Milton Keynes Hospital and scientists and doctors including world renowned cancer specialist Professor Karol Sikora, on ways of detecting prostate cancer from human breath and urine.

Dr Guest added: “Britain has one of the worst rates of early cancer detection in Europe. The NHS needs to be bolder about introducing new innovative methods to detect cancer in its early stages.

“Our dogs have higher rates of reliability than most of the existing tests. We know their sense of smell is extraordinary. They can detect parts per trillion - that’s the equivalent of one drop of blood in two Olympic-sized swimming pools. We should not be turning our backs on these highly sensitive bio-detectors just because they have furry coats.”

Two charities, the Graham Fulford Charitable Trust and the Prostate Cancer Support Group, are interested in rolling out the diagnostic service once the trial is complete.

Gary Steele, who founded the Prostate Cancer Support Group, said: “If they can prove in this study that dogs are reliable at detecting cancer, then we will have the evidence we need to offer sample screening by dogs as an optional test in our cancer clinic.”