"Diabetic Alert-Dogs"

[Eddy Edson]

https://www.newsday.com/long-island/nassau/diabetes-service-dog-judge-1.21018319

Barney is a 2-year-old Irish doodle and Sturim’s diabetic-alert dog. For most of his day, he quietly naps under the bench. But he’s also trained to help Sturim manage his blood sugar, alerting the judge when he should check his levels and take insulin.
...
Trainers say diabetic-alert dogs use their strong sense of smell to detect subtle changes in body odor and alert their owner to check their levels. Sturim selected Barney from a group of puppies at Diabetic Alert Dogs of America, a Las Vegas-based company, and he underwent 10 months of scent training.

Barney paws at Sturim whenever he detects something wrong, sometimes before Sturim begins to feel symptoms. He’s even woken Sturim at night, saving him from a low blood sugar episode.
....
The science supporting alert dogs is limited, said Matt Petersen, vice president of medical information and professional engagement at the American Diabetes Association.

I'm not a big dog-lover, but there's no way I'd trust the cat with something like this. Not with the way it looks at me when it thinks I don't notice.

 

[mikeyB]

Can’t access the link, get a message that as I’m in the EU I’m not allowed.

That said, it sounds perfectly believable. Though I’d rather rely on a meter

 

[Eddy Edson]

Can’t access the link, get a message that as I’m in the EU I’m not allowed.

That said, it sounds perfectly believable. Though I’d rather rely on a meter

Yeah, I think my preference would be meter => diabetic-alert dog => nothing => diabetic-alert cat.

 

[Northerner]

They can be life-savers. I've met two of them from the UK charity Medical Alert Assistance Dogs - one of our long-standing members has one 🙂 I also raised money for the charity a few years back 🙂 In the US though, there have been a few scandals where people sell the dogs as being 'specially trained', but they are nothing of the sort, it's just a scam to get $20,000 out of people 😡

 

[Eddy Edson]

Yeah, the article mentions that scam:

One 2017 study published in the Journal of Diabetes Science and Technology found that dogs were less accurate than a blood glucose meter. Petersen said scientists still are unsure what exactly diabetic-alert dogs are responding to. In 2017, the state of Virginia filed a suit against a diabetic-alert-dog company there, accusing the owners of duping consumers into buying expensive pets.

“It’s not a substitute,” Petersen said. “Our concern is people coming to rely on the dog instead of the glucose meter.”

Representatives at Diabetic Alert Dogs of America did not respond to requests for comment. In a Newsday story in May about a diabetic alert dog for a Farmingdale girl with type 1 diabetes, a trainer at the National Institute of Diabetic Alert Dogs in California said that the animals can provide warnings 15 to 30 minutes before problems show up in the blood.

“They have 220 million scent receptors and can sense when something is off very quickly by smelling a person’s body secretions, including saliva, sweat and breath,” said Breanne Peeples.

The dogs aren’t covered by insurance and can range in price from several thousand dollars to $25,000. It’s not clear how many people are using the dogs, though Petersen said the American Diabetes Association began hearing of them only in the past few years. Diabetic Alert Dogs of America delivers about 12 fully trained dogs each month and has trained more than 600 dogs in the past decade, according .

 

[Lisa66]

I can't access the link either.

I have seen someone at my clinic with an alert dog. I like the part that's says dogs were less accurate than a glucose meter. I now imagine the dogs having a sniff and then barking out the result "2.9 get a jelly baby...and a boneo for me"🙂

 

[Northerner]

I can't access the link either.

I have seen someone at my clinic with an alert dog. I like the part that's says dogs were less accurate than a glucose meter. I now imagine the dogs having a sniff and then barking out the result "2.9 get a jelly baby...and a boneo for me"🙂

The dogs are more like a CGM - they 'alarm' when levels are low - or high! 🙂 The member's dog I met - Ken - is probably the most chilled out labrador I've ever encountered! 🙂 How's he doing @Barb? 🙂

 

[Lisa66]

Just in case there's any doubt...and for clarification, for anyone that may think I'm a complete numpty, I would just like to say I did realise this.😛

 

[Northerner]

Just in case there's any doubt...and for clarification, for anyone that may think I'm a complete numpty, I would just like to say I did realise this.😛

Hehe! I did realise Lisa!

 

[Martin Canty]

With S&R I have worked with some very talented dogs, one, recently led us along a trail a couple of miles to a gate (where they lost the scent) but allowed us to narrow in our search area significantly. Unfortunately, with the very localized rain we had had (lifting the scent) it was unable to follow the trail all the way to the victim; which we found by good old fashioned searching
Another (a few years ago) was able to detect scent even a few decades old, alas the conditions were not conducive to picking up a site in this area.

 

[Northerner]

With S&R I have worked with some very talented dogs, one, recently led us along a trail a couple of miles to a gate (where they lost the scent) but allowed us to narrow in our search area significantly. Unfortunately, with the very localized rain we had had (lifting the scent) it was unable to follow the trail all the way to the victim; which we found by good old fashioned searching
Another (a few years ago) was able to detect scent even a few decades old, alas the conditions were not conducive to picking up a site in this area.

Have a read of this story 🙂

https://forum.diabetes.org.uk/boards/threads/keep-crawling-forest-gump.12524/

 

[Martin Canty]

Have a read of this story 🙂

https://forum.diabetes.org.uk/boards/threads/keep-crawling-forest-gump.12524/

Thank you, Alan, great account of the power of dogs.....

 

[Lisa66]

Hehe! I did realise Lisa!

Phew, ha ha 🙂