Dogs Detecting Cancer

This is pretty interesting stuff. Some dogs have been trained to detect cancer on the breath of patients, and some initial studies are quite promising:

The canine "diagnostic tools" -- two Portuguese water dogs and three Labrador retrievers -- were borrowed from their local owners and Guide Dogs for the Blind. The dogs were trained for roughly three weeks using the "click and reward" method.

When the dogs successfully detected which tubes held breath samples from cancer patients they heard a click and then received a food reward. The dogs were trained to sit or lie down when they detected a diseased sample.

After conducting more than 12,200 separate "dog/breath sample interactions," researchers reported the dogs had an 88 percent accuracy rate in detecting breast cancer and a 99 percent accuracy rate in detecting lung cancer.

The article doesn't state what stage cancer these dogs were able to pick up, but this certainly bears further watching.