There is a new stress reliever in Southern California and his name is Jasper. He is the first alpaca to be registered with the Delta Society’s Pet Partner program. He is owned by Kaylynn Turner, a 10 year old girl who bonded with the alpaca after meeting him at an alpaca ranch near Murietta. It was Kaylynns idea to make Jasper a therapy animal because of his unusually docile temperament and affinity for children. After being checked out by handlers, trainers and a veterinarian, Jasper is now certified as a therapy animal and has already visited one nursing home and has other stops scheduled. Jasper’s family hopes that he inspires other people to become involved and volunteer. Are you willing to take the challenge? Consider the Delta Society’s Pet Partner Program. It is a very well organized and well supported pet therapy program. Check out their website: www.deltasociety.org

Here is an interesting article I would like to share from a Newstat from the American Animal Hospital Association:

A small-scale study in a Paris research hospital suggests that dogs are capable of sniffing out prostate cancer, according to the American Urological Association.

Dogs have been shown in other studies to be able to detect the smells of other types of cancer, such as bladder, breast and skin cancers.

For the French experiment, researchers trained dogs to identify urine samples from men with confirmed prostate cancer. According to the AUA, the dogs were able to “recognize the characteristic olfactory signatures of prostate cancer-derived [volatile organic compounds.]”.

“These data suggest that prostate cancer tumors may excrete certain VOCs that turn up in a patient’s urine and that this ‘scent’ may be specific to prostate cancer,” said Anthony Smith, MD, who moderated the session at the AUA’s annual meeting where the results of the study were reported. “What we need to do now is figure out what those VOCs are and whether or not we can develop a specific test to identify them.”

The dogs were able to correctly identify 63 out of 66 samples as being urine from prostate cancer patients. The misidentified samples were all false positives, the AUA said.

How is that for amazing!

I just watched a short video on The Delta Society’s website. It was a clip by Dr. Edward Creagan of The Mayo Clinic speaking on the health benefit of pets. He said his career underwent a dramatic change when one night when he was on the hospital floor a gentleman with advanced lung cancer and pneumonia was admitted. The doctors did not think this man would make it through the night but he did in fact improve with his team of doctors helping him. The man told them that the catalyst for him getting home was his 95 pound German Shepherd, Max. Max was the reason this man wanted to live. This man changed Dr. Creagan’s view of the value of pets in his patient’s lives. He said that since then, he always speaks with patients about their pets, calling them by name. His patient’s attitudes consistently change when they begin speaking about their animals. He said, “The atmosphere becomes one of healing and peace and serenity. We now know there is a surge of hormones deep within the center of the brain. They provoke a tremendous feeling of peace, of serenity, of tranquility. They decrease our blood pressure. They decrease our pulse rate. They lessen our depression…so when a patient tells us they went to the shelter to rescue a pet, in effect, that pet is rescuing them.” The healing power of pets…even the Mayo Clinic knows! Please share your personal experiences with this tremendous healing power in your own life. I have spoken with enough of you to know that The Drake Center is full of these beautiful stories.