A doctor told Heather May she had the flu, but the dog she adopted, a big yellow Lab named Scout, seemed to know something more serious was going on.
“I was home resting, and Scout would not leave my side,” May says. “He was on the bed with his head on top of me. He was refusing to eat. I didn’t know what was wrong with him.”
The Dallas, Texas-area attorney says she finally got Scout outside to potty in the backyard.
“I sat in my recliner because I felt dizzy, and the next thing I knew, Scout was scratching at the door, barking and banging,” May said. “I realized I was sitting in a completely different position in my chair than when I had sat down.”
When Scout came inside, he jumped into the recliner with her. “Then I lost time again,” May said. “At that point, I figured out I was having seizures.”
May stood up and tried to call for her husband upstairs, but she couldn’t yell loud enough.
“I got dizzy and grabbed one of the breakfast bar stools,” May says. “The next thing I know, I was on the ground flopping around, and I banged my head. Scout was trying to get underneath me as much as he could, and he was barking like crazy.”
When May’s husband heard Scout’s commotion, he ran downstairs, saw her on the ground, called 9-1-1, and EMTs rushed her to the hospital.
It turned out that the electrical signals in May’s heart were misfiring; she had a complete heart block, a life-threatening condition.
But how did Scout know something was wrong? Do dogs know when you are sick? Can they tell? Can they sense it?
Can Dogs Smell When You’re Sick?
Dogs may very well sense that you are sick because they can sniff out many illnesses and medical conditions.
“When we are ill, our body chemistry changes, and we know that dogs can sense a good deal of that,” says Dr. Stanley Coren, Professor Emeritus in the Department of Psychology at the University of British Columbia, and an esteemed researcher and writer about the intelligence of dogs.
Researchers are still just scratching the surface when it comes to figuring out all the medical conditions dogs’ extraordinary noses may be able to sniff out.
Cancer, Covid, and neurological disorders are just some of the ailments scientists have confirmed dogs can sense.
Other Ways Dogs May Known You’re Sick
Aside from changes in smell, when a person is sick, they may be in pain or feeling stressed. Dogs may also pick up on that.
Studies have found that dogs can recognize rising cortisol levels, a hormone that increases when someone feels anxious or nervous.
Dr. Coren has witnessed this first-hand. Over the years, he’s trained his personal pups to be therapy dogs. He and his associates have taken them to group mental health counseling sessions, and they have always observed the same outcome.
“The dogs seem to recognize who needs the most care, and they will wander over to them in the group and pay attention,” Dr. Coren says. “We know that dogs can read those kinds of emotions. They can read who’s stressed and who’s afraid.”
Physical cues aside, many pup parents swear dogs “just know” when they need consoling when they’re sick. How do they pull that off?
“I think their disease detection abilities are something which we can train and use,” Dr. Coren says. “But dogs’ overall behavioral response to our illness is because of the emotional changes which the illness produces.”
Can Dogs Really Tell When You’re Sick?
Canines don’t only have incredible noses; they also have keen powers of observation and dogs have spent tens of thousands of years reading humans. It’s clear they’ve gotten pretty good at sensing our emotional states and knowing our habits.
“We have systematically bred [dogs] so that they are more responsive to us, so that they respond to our linguistic cues, and to our emotional cues,” Dr. Coren says. “They become very, very aware of your normal behaviors. So, if your behaviors start to drift from what is normal, dogs may begin to respond, and that seems to be at the basis of a lot of these behavioral changes we see in the dogs. They’re sort of monitoring our behavior and mirroring it, if you will.”
Dogs also become accustomed to their schedule; think of the “crisis” Daylight Saving Time causes when their usual dinner time is off.
“The major thing which triggers a dog’s responses when you get sick is that your routine changes and you aren’t doing all of the usual things that you do,” Dr. Coren says. “So, you may curtail your walks, and you’re certainly moving more slowly, or you might be bedridden, and that causes a problem for dogs.”
The double whammy of changes in a human’s actions and habits when they’re sick can be upsetting for our four-legged family members. “Dogs love the fact that behaviors are predictable and dogs love routine,” Dr. Coren says.
This renowned researcher even experienced this phenomenon with one of his own dogs, Wiz.
“Wiz was like most Cavalier King Charles Spaniels,” Dr. Coren says. “He was incredibly passive and friendly, but the only time that we ever saw him display any sort of possessiveness was over his toys.”
But years ago, when Dr. Coren was sick and stuck in bed, his illness seemed to prompt a change of heart in Wiz’s typical behavior.
“One day, I awakened from a long sleep, and I found that Wiz had taken three of his favorite toys and dropped them on my chest,” Dr. Coren says. “I figured that it was his way of responding to my illness by bringing his most treasured possessions.”
While there are many plausible scientific explanations about how your dog seems to know you’re sick, when they do try to comfort, console, or alert you, it feels like some interspecies canine connection that is nothing less than a miracle.
Canine Connections
In May’s case, luckily, she reached the hospital in time to receive a pacemaker, which is now helping regulate her heartbeat.
But she remains astonished by how Scout knew something was so dreadfully wrong.
Did he sense a change in her heart rate? (Which is also something dogs can detect.) Was it a change in their routine? Or a dog superpower researchers have yet to identify?
May may never know, but she plans to take it seriously if Scout, or any of her dogs, seems to be signaling something is not right.
“Listen to your dog if they start acting out of the ordinary or try to get your attention,” May says. “If Scout starts acting like that again, I will say, ‘Take me to the hospital, and I’m not leaving until you have run every workup you possibly can, because my dog is telling me something is wrong.”
