If the amount of time you spend with someone has anything to do with how close they are to you, dogs would certainly have to qualify as man's best friend, having been man's companion for 15 millennia. As close as the bond may be that dogs and humans share, there is still quite a lot the most people don't understand about the dogs a species, dog health problems included. Here's a look at a few doggie health facts that you may not have been aware of.
How close is the bond that dogs have with man? Well, let's look at it this way - we've been together for so long that pathogens in our environment have long since learned how to make the jump between man and dog. A lot of the diseases that affect man affect dogs as well. For instance, millions of dogs every year but lost to cancer, a quintessentially human disease. There are certain obscure human disorders, like the neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis disease that causes partial paralysis, that affect man and dog equally. The fact that man and dog share the same kinds of diseases is a good thing. It makes it easier for researchers to find cures for dog health problems. They mostly have to just use the drugs that are used for humans and dose them differently for dogs.
While dogs may be able to benefit from the fact that dog health problems share many similarities with human ones, there is a health benefit that humans are able to take advantage of too from their relationship with dogs. With diseases like diabetes, epilepsy or cancer, dogs find out about them long before any test or doctor ever does. Apparently, the abnormal cells involved in these diseases give out the faintest of scents that dogs are able to pick up. People with diabetes for instance don't need to constantly have their sugar levels checked with a blood glucose monitor; they can easily do this with a trained companion dog. When a person’s blood sugar levels begin to rise, a dog can easily sniff it out. They can even predict epileptic seizures.
Dog health problems can affect humans in many ways though. Know that old saw about how the mouth of a dog is cleaner than the mouth of a human? Well, that's preposterous of course. But quite apart from that, there are all kinds of ways in which dogs can infect humans. And rabies is only one of them. Dog food doesn't pass the stringent tests that food intended for humans does. Often enough, dogs happen to be immune to things like salmonella; so it doesn't make any sense for pet food manufacturers to go to the trouble of radiating their products to rid them of salmonella. However, when that dog licks you after having eaten a salmonella-contaminated meal, guess who gets ill? Roundworms, parasitic bugs that are found on a dog's coat, can cause all kinds of vision and intestinal problems in people. And you get them just by stroking a dog. Washing your hands before a meal, when there is a dog in the house, can be a good practice to follow.
