Cancer screening trial using sniffer dogs needs more funds, trainers … and dogs
Japanese trials are underway to train more medical sniffer dogs capable of sniffing out cancer in urine, which reduces the need for invasive tests while saving more lives because of the early detection
With trial cancer screenings using sniffer dogs being carried out in a Japanese town, researchers are hoping to make the non-invasive health checks widely available across Japan.
But experts say securing experienced handlers and attracting financial resources will be crucial to boosting the number of trained sniffer dogs available to make the programme more practical to implement in future.
In Japan, there are only five cancer sniffer dogs. All of them were trained by Yuji Sato, 70, who heads a dog training centre, St. Sugar Japan, based in Tateyama, Chiba prefecture, near Tokyo.
The Labrador retrievers are busy analysing urine samples from residents of Kaneyama, in northeast Japan’s Yamagata prefecture, where locals have signed up for cancer screening trials that started in May.
Each dog reacts differently, but one of the dogs consistently stops in front of a box where it detects some sign of cancer in a urine sample. Since the cancer-indicating odour is much less pronounced than that of drugs or footprints normally sniffed out by police dogs, training requires significant effort and technique, Sato says.
“They can only demonstrate cancer sniffing ability through the repetition of daily training. A handler has to carefully look at their character, condition, temperature and hormone balance change as these factors affect their performance,” he says.
It costs about 5 million yen (US$43,850) to train a dog over three years. To boost effectiveness, two years or more of additional training may be needed, Sato says.