Dogs Sniff Out 63 of 66 Prostate Cancer Samples
For the new study, researchers led by Jean-Nicolas Cornu,
Replica NHL jerseys MD, also of Tenon Hospital, trained a Belgian Malinois -- a shepherd breed used for detecting bombs and drugs -- to identify urine from patients with confirmed prostate cancer and then to discriminate those samples from urine from healthy men. After about a year of training, the dog was put to the test. During 11 runs, the dog faced six urine samples, only one of which came from a man with prostate cancer. Its mission: To sit in front of the urine it considers cancer.
In 66 tests, the dog was correct 63 times. There were three false positives, in which the dog mistakenly identified samples from healthy men as being cancerous. And there were no false negatives.
And one of the three false positives might not have been that false; when the man who provided the urine sample had another biopsy, he turned out to have prostate cancer, Bigot says.
Other dogs are now being trained, he says.
'Electronic Nose' for Prostate Cancer Detection
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The low false-positive rate "is pretty spectacular," Smith says.
"But this is a very small study," and it remains to be seen if the findings will hold up in other studies, he says.
Skeptics are concerned that the animals may be picking up on subconscious signals from researchers, among other things, Smith says.
The next step is to figure out what chemicals or combination of chemicals the dog is sensing, he says.
If the approach does pan out, don't look for dogs running around hospitals, sniffing urine samples. That would be impractical and prohibitively expensive, Bigot says.
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But if researchers can identify which chemical the dog is reacting to, they hope to develop an "electronic nose" for more accurate prostate cancer detection, he says.
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