Hello Friend,

A cheery Wednesday to you, your dogs, cats, and other family members!

Today's article highlights just some of the unique abilities our dogs have, and specifically how that can be used to help us.

Just when you think "I know it all", something new happens to surprise us

I suspect that you can learn many 'new' ways to help your dog at home with my upcoming free natural dog health and nutrition webinar:

http://www.thedogsupplement.com/webinar

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Penn Vet Working Dog Center Collaborating on Ovarian Cancer Detection Study
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In a unique, interdisciplinary collaboration, the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine’s Working Dog Center, The School of Arts and Science's Department of Physics and Astronomy, Penn Medicine’s Division of Gynecologic Oncology and the Monell Chemical Senses Center have joined together to study ovarian cancer detection by dogs and e-sensors.

Ovarian cancer is the fifth leading cause of cancer-related deaths in women in the U.S. If diagnosed early, ovarian cancer has a five-year survival rate of over 90 percent. However, an effective screening strategy does not currently exist for its detection. Because ovarian cancer symptoms can be easily mistaken for other issues – constipation, weight gain, bloating, or more frequent urination – more than 60 percent of patients are diagnosed only after the disease has spread to their lymph nodes or other distant sites in the body, when treatment is much less likely to produce a cure compared to when the disease is detected early. Any advance that can accurately detect ovarian cancer in its early stage can have a great impact on overall survival.

Currently, physicians rely on their senses of sight, sound and touch when making a diagnosis for ovarian cancer. Through the research being conducted by Penn and Monell, the sense of smell will now play an integral role in diagnostics.

It has been found that volatile organic compounds (VOC) or odorants are altered in the earliest stages of ovarian cancer, even before the cancer can be detected by current methods. Research has shown that trained detection dogs and electronic devices can detect minute quantities of odorants. Tissue and blood samples from healthy patients and from ovarian cancer patients will be collected by Penn Medicine’s Division of Gynecologic Oncology to be shared with the Working Dog Center for training and analysis.

“These odorants remain a relatively untapped source for cancer detection information,” said Cynthia Otto, DVM, PhD, Director of the Working Dog Center and Associate Professor of Critical Care at Penn Vet. “By utilizing the acute sense of smell in detection dogs in conjunction with chemical and nanotechnology methods, we hope to develop a new system of screening for ovarian cancer using analysis of odorants to facilitate early detection and help decrease future cancer deaths.”



Heal Your Pet At Home!

Best Wishes,

Dr Andrew Jones, DVM


P.S. Wonderful idea, and I hope this becomes part of regular practice.

P.P.S.  As a Bonus for signing up for my new webinar, you'll also get the NEW complimentary dog food secrets report which shows you HOW to choose a  quality inexpensive food, PLUS specific kitchen ingredients you can add to dramatically improve the quality of your dog's commercial food.


http://www.thedogsupplement.com/webinar

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DISCLAIMER: This information is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace the advice of your own veterinarian. Dr Andrew Jones resigned from the College of Veterinarians of B.C. effective December 1 2010, meaning he cannot answer specific questions about your pet's medical issues or make specific medical recommendations for your pet.

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