Blog #135: DOES YOUR POOCH SEEM TO PREDICT YOUR NEXT SEIZURE?

 

This anecdotal study reviewed below should promote keeping a closer eye on your pet dog’s behavior prior to a seizure. Perhaps you have already noted your dog’s altered behavior before your seizures, but you weren’t sure the behavior was meaningful. Read on. Learn of the compelling evidence that the behavior is meaningful but you weren’t sure of its significance.

The online epilepsy magazine, Epilepsy Today September 30, 2021, reviewed a new study from Queen’s University Belfast published in the journal MDPI (Molecular Diversity Preservation International) in July 2021. The study concluded that dogs could detect some unidentified odor that seems to be specifically associated with your seizures.¹

The research was led by Dr. Neil Powell. These anecdotal accounts from 19 epilepsy patients report their pet dogs give them warnings by trying to connect with their masters before their seizures occur. The researchers evaluated the dogs’ reactions to seizure-related and non-seizure-related odors. They employed a special tool called the Remote Odor Delivery Mechanism. The odors reflected three separate phases of a seizure: before, during and after. The researchers collected sweat pads from armpits from seizure patients and from non-seizure controls. The dogs reacted to the odors from seizure-patients other than their owners, too.

All 19 dogs showed a change in behavior related to seizures. They tried to connect with their owner because of some unidentified seizure-related odors compared with the non-seizure-related ones. Dr. Powell said our findings clearly showed that all dogs reacted to the seizure-associated odor through making eye contact by staring at their owner, touching their owner by nudging or pawing, crying or barking,”

This study was on dogs who had no prior training. The researchers concluded that if dogs can be trained to communicate that a seizure will soon occur this can improve the owner’s safety and quality of life. A program of targeted training for seizure prediction is being developed.

1)     Powell NA. Ruffell A. et.al.The Untrained Response of Pet Dogs to Human Epileptic Seizures. Animals 2021, 11(8), 2267; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani11082267 21 July 2021

Lance Fogan, M.D. is Clinical Professor of Neurology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. His hard-hitting emotional family medical drama, “DINGS”, is told from a mother’s point of view. “DINGS” is his first novel. It teaches epilepsy, now available in eBook, audiobook, and soft and hard cover editions.