What Horses Can Teach Us about Cancer Research
I have a horse named Sebastian. Most afternoons when I’ve seen my last patient and my dictations are (mostly) done, I race home, change clothes, and head out to the barn to be with him. Often Sebastian and his friend Stormy have positioned themselves at the far end of the pasture. This is where the best grass is after all.
Sebastian was trained by a natural horseman, a type of trainer that is often referred to as a “horse whisperer.” This type of training meant Sebastian spoke horse and, well, I didn’t. Despite my decades of riding experience, I struggled to overcome this communication gap. I was frustrated and ready to give up when a friend invited me to a three-day clinic hosted by trainer Greg Eliel. Greg grew up in Montana with Buck Brannaman, the man who inspired Robert Redford’s character in The Horse Whisperer. When Greg talks about horse training, he says he doesn’t help people with horse problems; he helps horses with their people problems.
Historically, horses were trained by cowboys through pain avoidance and/or exhaustion. You may have heard the phrase “breaking colts” which literally refers to breaking the spirit of a young horse in order to tolerate a saddle and rider. Basically, what happens is a saddle is placed on a young horse and a strong, young cowboy gets in the saddle. Panicking and uncomfortable with the unfamiliar weight on his back and girth under his belly, the young horse bucks to try to get rid of both. When the horse grows tired of bucking and the rider stays on, the horse is considered “saddle broke.” Ideally this process takes just a few hours. In addition to a “broke” horse, the process often leaves cowboys with one or more broken bones. The rodeo sport of bronc riding originates from contests to determine which cowboy could outlast a particularly spirited animal.
In contrast, the natural horsemanship approach to training encourages us to think about the horse’s perspective rather than breaking the spirit of the animal. Take me rushing out to the barn after work. Sebastian has spent all day being a horse: grazing, napping, swishing away flies. Horses, natural horsemanship argues, are not cars or motorcycles, ready on demand. They are beings with internal lives, relationships, and preferences. (Like preferring to stand in the pasture grazing rather than working on flying lead changes with me in an arena.) Sebastian doesn’t think about me until I come walking down the hill with a halter in my hand. Huh, Sebastian thinks, I’ve seen this lady move like that before. This means work, not standing here eating with my friend. (It is a testament to his tolerance or the carrots in my pocket that he always walks up to me and does not run away as fast as he can.) I could force him to work with me through pain or exhaustion. Or I can work on the relationship with the horse. Like any relationship, this takes time. And the occasional treat.
Science is more like Sebastian in the pasture, not always ready at the exact moment we need it. Discovery requires long term investment and dedication. Entire careers are spent isolating a single molecule MIGHT lead, a decade later, to a new drug. Monumental shifts in human health have not, as folklore would have us believe, been the result of a single scientist drinking mold from a contaminated dish or putting a hand in front of a perfectly constructed x-ray tube. Each discovery has been and continues to be built on the hard, often uncelebrated work, of showing up every day, getting it wrong, learning something and trying again the next day. And the next, and the next.
There are no guarantees in horse training or in science. If we are practicing good science or good training, we are constantly learning, trying something that didn’t work, modifying our experiment and trying again. With consistent gentle application and release of pressure of my leg on his belly, for example, Sebastian eventually learns this means to trot.
And I have to be careful not to shut down Sebastian when he attempts to answer one of my requests. I reward the try. Even if it’s not perfect, it’s progress. If Sebastian shows different behavior after a cue, that means he’s thinking and that’s a good thing. Eventually, he tries the thing that I want him to do and gets a big reward like resting or a pat on the neck. Over time, he figures out what I’m asking for. If I shut down his initial “wrong” tries, however, he learns not to try anything new. Why should he when he knows punishment awaits?
Like Sebastian, researchers need to be given the opportunity to try…and get it wrong. The scientific method, a foundational principle of evidence-based medicine, requires that we test every new idea against the old and then accept whichever does better. Sometimes science tells us that the old way still works. Other times, we discover something new.
Either way, science is the process of testing, always remaining open to the realization that what we believed before might now be wrong. This constant questioning can be difficult for cancer patients facing a life-threatening illness. This is cancer, after all; They want us to BE SURE this is the right treatment.
Like training horses, if we want progress, we must encourage innovation, not shut down learning. And that means supporting our best researchers to take chances, fall down, and try again. If we want to get to a cure faster, we have to support failing faster.
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