Cancer Investigations on Dogs Bring Insights in New Therapies for Humans

The National Cancer Institute in Bethesda located in the United States hosts a group of researchers that claim that by examining the pet dogs which suffer from cancer, the medical doctors would be able to getter a better understanding of the disease, screening it better and last but not least, improve the treatments for human being cancers. The study is released in the PLos Medicine journal.

The investigators state that a closer observation of the malign disease in dogs should be thoroughly studied in order to create and implement new treatments, gadgets and scanning methods for people that are affected with cancer.

Statistics claim that nearly one million fresh cancer illnesses are diagnosed in dogs all over the territory of the United States yearly. The suffering animals are taken care of in a similar way human beings are. Their therapy includes operations, irradiation and even chemo treatments. Furthermore, the owners of the quadrupeds show significant interest in trying brand new treatments and drugs in order to heal or at least diminish their pets` sufferings.

Doctor Chand Khanna is the leading author of this study which took place at the Centre for Cancer Research at the National Cancer Institute. His opinion is that by examining the cancers` evolution in our quadruped friends, the medical world will be able to get a better understanding of this matter and come up with new strategies for dealing with human beings` cancers. Thus, he proposes clinical trials on dogs to acquire this knowledge. The reason for experimenting on dogs is the fact that the malign sufferings they have are very similar to the tumors affecting people.

The investigation group state that the decision of a person owning a dog to try alternative and novel treatments with the view to cure their animals is linked to a series of factors. These main decision agents are represented by the risks and success a novel treatment comprises and also the fact that the price of the therapy is lower in a clinical trial than in an ordinary veterinary office.

Another important issue in the clinical trials for cancer suffering dogs is the fact that their owners see these experiments as a chance to improve the evolution of therapies counteracting human beings` cancer and also discovering new ways to fight against dog cancer as well.

Studying the animal cancer`s features and corresponding therapies is entitled comparative oncology. This strategy dates back over 30 or 40 years ago and many researchers made use of the comparative oncology in order to acquire more knowledge about how to counteract and understand the cancer affecting people. Some examples of the types of cancers studied in the comparative oncology are: osteosarcoma or bone cancer, melanoma and lymphoma.