Can people smell cancer? Has anyone smelled a sweet smell on someone with cancer?

Question

I know it sounds silly, but have a friend who said she smelled a scent about herself for a few months now and she turned out to have cancer.
Only she can smell the smell and I smelled her to see if I could smell something, nothing but soap. She is discusted with the smell and she really thinks she smells funny. She doesn't! No, not even down there, her hubby said he smelled her to see if that was the source. She is frustrated that no one else can smell this smell.

Answer 1

Cancer does have a smell. I was watching a show on tv the other night about dogs being trained to sniff out cancer in it's earliest stages. Dogs have super sensitive noses many times more powerful than our own. So I guess it is possible. I have never heard of a human being able to do that though.

Weird fact though...When I was young my mom and I were in a shoe store and she kept smelling something very sweet.. This went on for about a week. Her grand-father died and when we walked into the funeral home she smelled the roses. She said that is the smell I have been smelling. Every since then, every time she starts smelling that sweet smell, someone we know dies within a week. It is very spooky, but very true.

Answer 2

Can You Smell Cancer

Answer 3

There is definitely a scent expelled in the breath when people have cancers, all different types, from kidney, lung, breast, and other cancers.

There are medical studies being done where dogs are trained to recognize the scent by a breath sample in a glass tube, apparently, using samples from people that who have cancer.

The household dogs, are just ordinary dogs and they indicate this by sitting in front of the samples of breathe that are positive for cancer.

I do not know if it is a " sweet" smell, but so far dogs can detect those particles in the breath that indicate cancer.
As we know, dogs have a highly advanced sense of smell, that is how they understand the world around them, through their nose. It is also why they use dogs to find people, and to find truffles under the ground.

I am not sure people are trained to do that, yet. More research is being conducted, and perhaps it will advance the detection of cancer, far sooner that today's medical diagnostic machines. This article called " Dogs Detect Cancer in Humans" is on the resource site listed below, and it is very interesting. Hope this helps.

Answer 4

I haven't heard of people smelling cancer. Usually if someone smell a fruit/sweet smell it is diabetes. However they are doing research that dogs may be able to smell cancer.

Answer 5

I don't know about the cancer but I do have a friend who would smell "burning" for the longest time. The smell would come and go and sometimes be so strong that she would go look all over for a "fire" that was never there. Turned out to be she has some sort of brain seizures and she is right now under dr's care and taking meds for it. The smells are all gone since.
Her mom used to smell "ginger" although now deceased they never diagnosed her. My friend now believes she might have inherited that from her mom.

Answer 6

We took care of my great grandma at our house. She had cancer all over her body. It smelled bad. It took forever to get it out of the house after she passed away. Whether or not it was the cancer, I can't say, but obviously she was well cared for and clean, so that's the only conclusion I can draw in my experience; smelled like decay.

Answer 7

When I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer, my husband said that I'd had really bad breath for several months prior. We were still newlyweds and he didn't want to hurt my feelings so he never told me. After my thyroid was removed and the cancer was gone, he told me that I no longer had that bad breath. Ever since then I just tell him, "if you ever smell that bad breath again, tell me immediately because the cancer may return."

It wasn't a sweet smell...just really bad breath.

Answer 8

No I douint think they can, but they do train some canines to be able to smell if someone has cancer...It's pretty cool. What would be cooler is if they could tame Wolverines and then use them to sniff for cancer cuz ther nasal power is like 50x stronger.

Answer 9

Her body may have been doing things that tricked her brain into thinking she smelled somthing sweet.

You follow?

Sort of like people who have epilepsy sometimes see an aura or hear ringing before they have a seizure. Sometimes our bodies perceive something that really isn't there but has some mysterious link to our physiology. Just a guess,,,

Answer 10

Maybe she just has problems with her sense of smell. By the way, dogs are able to sniff if a person has cancer. Anyway, there needs to be a cure!