Philadelphia researchers train dogs to detect "silent killer" canine cancer

There is new hope in the fight against a devastating cancer in dogs that is often deadly.

Researchers at the Penn Vet Working Dog Center in South Philadelphia are training dogs to help detect hemangiosarcoma, a form of canine cancer.

The dogs learn how to identify the cancer by smelling three boxes, with one containing a sample of malignant blood.

"It really does feel like magic because I can't smell anything from the samples. It's a tiny drop of blood serum," Clara Wilson, a researcher at the Working Dog Center, said. "We wanted to focus on hemangiosarcoma, which is a really devastating canine cancer."

Hemangiosarcoma is a tumor that is often called the silent killer because it grows in the body and goes unnoticed until it's too late.

In the first phase of the research, the dogs identified the cancer 70% of the time. And when they get it right, they get a treat.

Until now, the research primarily focused on human cancers, with the dogs being able to identify ovarian and pancreatic cancer.

"Dogs are very unique because they have this incredible sense of smell," Wilson said. "It just really does feel amazing and gives me a lot of respect for understanding that there's a lot of things that I can't understand that they're picking up on."

Once the dogs identify the cancer, researchers look for markers in the samples that could eventually be used to create a test that would find the cancer early, when it's more treatable.

"The idea is that if dogs can smell something, that means that there's a signal to detect," Wilson said.

These dogs are laying the groundwork for eventually being able to find cancer early and save lives for both humans and animals.

The working dog center also trains dogs to detect drugs, bombs and alert for medical conditions.