Esmaeil Eskandari1,2, Milad Ahmadi Marzaleh2,3,4,5,6, Hassan Roudgari7,8,9, Ramin Hamidi Farahani10, Amir Nezami-Asl11, Reza Laripour12, Helen Aliyazdi2,13, Arasb Dabbagh Moghaddam14, Ramin Zibaseresht15, Hossein Akbarialiabad16, Mojtaba Yousefi Zoshk17, Hamidreza Shiri18, Mahdi Shiri19. 1. Researcher Relief and rescue Organization and SK9 Dogs Training School, Red crescent society of Islamic Republic of Iran, Tehran, Iran. 2. Research Center for Emergency and Disaster Resilience, Red Crescent Society of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Tehran, Iran. 3. Research Center for Health Management in Mass Gathering, Red Crescent society of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Tehran, Iran. 4. Department of Health in Disasters and Emergencies, Health Human Resources Research Center, School of Management and Medical Informatics, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran. 5. Health Policy Research Center, Institute of Health, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Fars, Iran. 6. Helal- Iran Institute, Red Crescent Society of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Tehran, Iran. 7. Genomics Research Centre, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. 8. Department of Research at Iran Medical Council, Tehran, Iran. 9. Head of Research Department at Iran Medical Council, Tehran, Iran. 10. Department of Infectious Diseases, Faculty of Medicine, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. 11. Medical Faculty of Aerospace and Subaquatic Medicine, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. 12. Researcher Center for Educational Research in Medical Sciences, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. 13. Researcher SK9 Dogs Training School, Shahriar, SK9 Dogs Training School, Tehran, Iran. 14. Researcher Department of Food Science, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. 15. Department of Chemistry (Christchurch) and Department of Chemistry and Physics, University of Canterbury and Maritime University of Imam Khomeini, Tehran, Iran. 16. Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran. 17. Department of Pediatrics, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. 18. Islamic Azad University, Share-Qods Branch, Tehran, Iran. 19. Researcher Toxicology Research Center, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. dr.mhdshiri@gmail.com.
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Sniffer dogs are able to detect certain chemical particles and are suggest to be capable of helping diagnose some medical conditions and complications, such as colorectal cancer, melanoma, bladder cancer, and even critical states such as hypoglycemia in diabetic patients. With the global spread of COVID-19 throughout the world and the need to have a real-time screening of the population, especially in crowded places, this study aimed to investigate the applicability of sniffer dogs to carry out such a task. METHODS: Firstly, three male and female dogs from German shepherd (Saray), German black (Kuzhi) and Labrador (Marco) breeds had been intensively trained throughout the classical conditioning method for 7 weeks. They were introduced to human specimens obtained from the throat and pharyngeal secretions of participants who were already reported positive or negative for SARS-COV-2 infection be RT-PCR. Each dog underwent the conditioning process for almost 1000 times. In the meantime another similar condition process was conducted on clothes and masks of COVID-19 patient using another three male and female dogs from Labrador (Lexi), Border gypsy (Sami), and Golden retriever (Zhico) breeds. In verification test for the first three dogs, 80 pharyngeal secretion samples consisting of 26 positive and 54 negative samples from different medical centers who underwent RT-PCR test were in a single-blind method. In the second verification test for the other three dogs, masks and clothes of 50 RT-PCR positive and 70 RT-PCR negative cases from different medical center were used. RESULTS: In verification test using pharyngeal secretion, the sniffer dogs' detection capability was associated with a 65% of sensitivity and 89% of specificity and they amanged to identify 17 out of the 26 positive and 48 out of the 54 true negative samples. In the next verification test using patients' face masks and clothes, 43 out of the 50 positive samples were correctly identified by the dogs. Moreover, out of the 70 negative samples, 65 samples were correctly found to be negative. The sensitivity of this test was as high as 86% and its specificity was 92.9%. In addition, the positive and negative predictive values were 89.6 and 90.3%, respectively. CONCLUSION: Dogs are capable of being trained to identify COVID-19 cases by sniffing their odour, so they can be used as a reliable tool in limited screening.
BACKGROUND: Sniffer dogs are able to detect certain chemical particles and are suggest to be capable of helping diagnose some medical conditions and complications, such as colorectal cancer, melanoma, bladder cancer, and even critical states such as hypoglycemia in diabeticpatients. With the global spread of COVID-19 throughout the world and the need to have a real-time screening of the population, especially in crowded places, this study aimed to investigate the applicability of sniffer dogs to carry out such a task. METHODS: Firstly, three male and female dogs from German shepherd (Saray), German black (Kuzhi) and Labrador (Marco) breeds had been intensively trained throughout the classical conditioning method for 7 weeks. They were introduced to human specimens obtained from the throat and pharyngeal secretions of participants who were already reported positive or negative for SARS-COV-2infection be RT-PCR. Each dog underwent the conditioning process for almost 1000 times. In the meantime another similar condition process was conducted on clothes and masks of COVID-19patient using another three male and female dogs from Labrador (Lexi), Border gypsy (Sami), and Golden retriever (Zhico) breeds. In verification test for the first three dogs, 80 pharyngeal secretion samples consisting of 26 positive and 54 negative samples from different medical centers who underwent RT-PCR test were in a single-blind method. In the second verification test for the other three dogs, masks and clothes of 50 RT-PCR positive and 70 RT-PCR negative cases from different medical center were used. RESULTS: In verification test using pharyngeal secretion, the sniffer dogs' detection capability was associated with a 65% of sensitivity and 89% of specificity and they amanged to identify 17 out of the 26 positive and 48 out of the 54 true negative samples. In the next verification test using patients' face masks and clothes, 43 out of the 50 positive samples were correctly identified by the dogs. Moreover, out of the 70 negative samples, 65 samples were correctly found to be negative. The sensitivity of this test was as high as 86% and its specificity was 92.9%. In addition, the positive and negative predictive values were 89.6 and 90.3%, respectively. CONCLUSION:Dogs are capable of being trained to identify COVID-19 cases by sniffing their odour, so they can be used as a reliable tool in limited screening.
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