Melissa Cushman Dog Training

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Gluten Detection

Sometimes despite our best efforts it is impossible to avoid gluten in our world. When my daughter was diagnosed with Celiac and needed to avoid even the smallest amount of gluten, I began to realize what a daunting and near impossible task that would be. Labeling laws allow for small amounts of gluten to be present in items and have them still be labeled Gluten FREE, yes read that again. It is possible to label something as Gluten Free and it can still contain gluten. In addition to this items that do not contain gluten naturally can be produced on the same lines as gluten containing items and be labeled gluten free. These issues and others can make it impossible for some of those individuals with Celiac to recover their health because they are constantly being exposed to low doses of gluten. In some of these cases a Gluten detection dog is the answer. After my daughter was diagnosed I worked with a wonderful trainer named Dawn Scheu at Willow Service Dogs Inc. to train our adult family dog Lilly to detect Gluten. My back ground in dog training made it possible for Lilly to start working quickly as she was already trained for safe public access. Unfortunately we lost Lilly suddenly to cancer shortly after she was fully trained. Thankfully we were already on a wait list for a puppy from a wonderful breeder who we had met with prior to losing Lilly! Gunther came along shortly after to mend our broken hearts and start training to protect our family (3 out of 4 of our family needs to be Gluten Free). Gunther began his training right away and was working at home before he was 6 months old. Gunther can reliably smell small amounts of cross contamination from gluten which not only keeps our family healthy but allows us to live a more normal life. Gluten detection dogs are definitely not for everyone but at the moment they are the most reliable method of testing items for contaminated gluten with a much higher reliability rate then commercially available testing devices. Last year I was asked to be part of an non profit organization O.D.O.R. Service Dogs Inc. that has worked hard to create minimum standards for working Scent Detection Dogs. I am honored to be part of an organization that hopes to make sure everyone has a service dog that is working safely and reliably. You can look at the standards which Gunther has been tested to at www.odorservicedogs.org.