Posted on 05/25/2021 5:08:55 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Four Maui dogs have been learning to sniff out virus in sweat
Four Maui-based canines are wrapping up a study that is training dogs to detect COVID-19 in a person’s sweat.
Makawao-based Assistance Dogs of Hawaii and The Queen’s Medical Center on Oahu partnered together late last year on the study, which has been using sweat samples from people to teach the dogs to hone in on the scent of the virus, which has infected and killed millions worldwide.
Next month the two organizations will be submitting their research for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, said Maureen Maurer, Assistance Dogs of Hawaii’s executive director.
“The goal of the study is to show what is possible and help to provide a practical application of this research to help screen people, even those who may be asymptomatic, at places like airports, schools and hospitals,” Maurer said in a news release.
In the meantime, Maurer said she is reaching out to local government officials to see if the dogs can lend a hand to COVID-19 screening. She is also sharing the organization’s training protocol with other agencies.
Tess (from left), Samson, Sadie and Yuki of Assistance Dogs of Hawaii are wrapping up a study to sniff out COVID-19 from human sweat.
Maurer has a Master of Science in Canine Studies and was the principal investigator in two earlier research studies that proved dogs could detect life-threatening bacterial infections in humans with an accuracy rate close to 99 percent.
Some breeds of dogs have more than 100 million scent receptors in their noses, compared to humans’ 5 million, according to the American Kennel Club. They have been trained to detect diseases like diabetes and cancer by learning to sniff out the difference between healthy and cancerous samples of human fluids.
Four dogs participated in the Hawaii study — Labrador retrievers Sadie, Tess and Yuki and golden retriever Samson.
“I think they’re incredible,” Maurer said Monday afternoon. “I think that dogs have so much untapped potential, especially in the field of medical biodetection. We are just beginning to discover what they are capable of.”
The dogs went through multiple phases that included training and sniffing hundreds of samples.
Samson, a golden retriever from Makawao-based Assistance Dogs of Hawaii, sniffs out human sweat samples for COVID-19.
Phase 1, which was completed in March and took place on Maui, involved training the dogs to distinguish the scent of COVID-19 from hundreds of other odors emitted through sweat.
Phase 2 called for a double-blind testing phase that was completed on Maui in April. This meant that no one in the room with the dogs knew where the positive samples were located in the lineup, so there would be no possibility of influencing the dogs’ response, Maurer explained.
Three dogs were presented with hundreds of samples from Queen’s and other COVID-19 testing sites. The dogs had an average sensitivity rate (correctly identifying positive samples) of close to 100 percent and an average specificity rate (correctly ignoring negative samples) of over 90 percent.
In Phase 3, which was completed last week at Queen’s, 3-year-old Labrador retriever Tess analyzed sweat samples from patients who had to get a PCR test a week before their surgeries at Queen’s.
She had a “close to 100 percent” accuracy rate in Phase 2, which was done on Maui, and Phase 3, or the “implementation” phase, at Queen’s on Oahu.
Human participation in the studies was voluntary. Phase 3 involved cotton ball samples of people’s sweat and/or body scent. Maurer added that the study was safe for people and the dogs, as the virus is not transmissible through sweat.
She said using canines to detect the virus is less expensive and results can be obtained in “real time” as compared to testing. Each dog could screen 200 to 300 samples per day.
She said the dogs can be especially effective in areas where there is a lack of tests.
Maurer explained that they are now trying to study how early on the dogs can detect the virus in humans, perhaps even prior to when COVID-19 symptoms show up.
She is looking for people who have been exposed to a household member who has tested positive for COVID-19, as the virus is most contagious before symptoms appear, she said.
Participants must live on Maui or Oahu and can contact the nonprofit Assistance Dogs of Hawaii at (808) 298-0167.
* Melissa Tanji can be reached at mtanji@mauinews.com.
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In Taiwan they have robots cruising the sidewalks searching for Covid or people with high temps.
My dogs detect chicken and liver sausage okay.😀
My dogs say I’m fine.
I still think you could make money with your dog. Put a few ads on Craigslist or whatever as a pregnancy detector.
Dogs are just so great.
He *still* checks every biologically eligible female.
:D
New TV series: “Hrafn, M.D.”
It’s be better than most of what’s on TV.
Gonna be hard to fit him into a white lab coat, though.
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