Sergeant Jake Watson has been training canines for years with the Montgomery sheriff's department. Now, a training task is more personal. Watson's daughter Ella has Type 1 Diabetes. She's insulin dependent and can even take her own blood sugar. But at such a young age, the disease can be a dangerous roller coaster. So her dad decided to train a British Lab as a diabetes alert dog.
The canine, Jude, could start sensing changes in Ella's blood sugar levels when he was just an 11 week old puppy. Now he alerts Ella's parents by bringing them a pink baton when he senses dangerously low or high levels. The Watsons trained Jude to know when Ella's blood sugar drops below 100 or spikes above 250. The dog actually smells the change in chemistry on Ella's breath. Jude bows when the blood sugar is low and waves when it's high.
"It does give us a sense of security because he can sense those changes, in between when we check her every three hours, her blood sugar can be really low or really high especially because she's so little. We can't always sense the change in her behaviour," said Watson.
There are only about 50 diabetes alert dogs in the US. Over the last five years, more and more families have started turning to the dogs to help monitor their loved ones with diabetes. Training a diabetes alert dog can cost up to $10,000. The Watsons saved on that expense, because of Jake's history with the canine training unit. The family knows not everyone can afford the dogs, so they've started participating the the Wildrose Kennel's non-profit organization. Every year 15,000 kids are diagnosed with the incurable disease.
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