Health: Detection Dogs

Debate between Lord Prior of Brampton and Lord Astor of Hever

Thursday 17th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the merits of using dogs to detect medical conditions.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Prior of Brampton) (Con)]

There is not, as yet, an established level of evidence to support the systematic application of the use of dogs within the NHS at this time. However, both the Department of Health and NHS England will be interested to see the outcome of the prostate cancer detection trials that recently started at Milton Keynes University Hospital with the charity Medical Detection Dogs.

[Lord Astor of Hever (Con)]

My Lords, each day that we sit in this House we trust dogs’ acute sense of smell of explosives to ensure our safety. Research shows that dogs detect human disease earlier than existing tests, which could increase survival rates and save the NHS millions of pounds. Will my noble friend’s department increase research capacity in this field and ensure that Britain remains a world leader?

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

My Lords, interestingly, the human nose contains some 5 million scent glands but a dog’s nose contains many more. In fact, the sniffing ability of a dog can be up to 10 million times that of the ability of a human being. Therefore we should not underestimate the contribution that dogs can make in this field. The trial being conducted at Milton Keynes University Hospital, which involves 3,000 patients giving urine samples, with nine dogs in a controlled environment over the three years, could indeed make a huge a contribution to the early detection of certain cancers. Therefore we will follow that trial with keen interest.