Ripley With Grade 3 Mast Cell Tumour

[Flealea]

Hi

I am looking for advice and experience on what to expect with chemo.

Ripley is my beloved almost 5 yr old Dogue de Bordeaux.

About 3 weeks ago, she had a 2cm mast cell tumour removed from one side of her chest, along with alot of flesh to hopefully get a good margin. It was small but graded "3" due to the nature of the cells.

We have opted for chemo as the specialist gave her a good prognosis for chemo due to the type, size, possible margin etc. to basically mop up any cells left behind.

But when we went in for the baseline blood test last night, the lymph node close to where the tumour was, is now swollen and an aspiration showed mast cells in the tumour.

We started her on prednisolone last night anyway, to await the specialists prognosis today.

The specialist said this was common, it's the node closest to the tumour, that often the node will be affected and "hold" the cells for some time before the spread starts outwards from there. So chemo now could shrink the node and kill off the cancer or send it into remission. And then after chemo, remove the lymph node. This is a setback and her long term survival is a little less optimistic than before, but still reasonable.

They assure me she won't get sick like people do, that they use a low dosage of Verblastin. Sure I can't image she will feel great, but if the side effects are too great, I will stop.

Basically I would like to hear about Grade 3 mast cell tumours others have exprienced, did it spread quickly, did they do chemo, what should I expect with the chemo, what was the lifespan with a grade 3 MCT either with or without chemo, etc.

If there is anything that anyone can suggest for me to do, I will very much appreciate any comments or advice.

Regards

Leanne

[dogbesotted]

sorry to hear about the diagnosis.

check in on ollies thread here. and see all natural vet in sydney. excellent vets. treated my lucinda for mct grade 3

cheers

helen

[Staffyluv]

Hiya, I am Ollie's owner - check his thread out, there is so much info in there about what you are about to go through. Our whole journey is there to share.

He was diagnosed in late 2005 with MCT grade 2 (multiple tumour sites) no clear margins on excision and it was already in his lymph system. He was given 12-18 months - it is now nearly 4 years post dxd. Yes he still has tumours, yes he is in remission, the tumours are not active and they don't releasing histamine. He was 8 when dxd.

We did 6 months of chemo (vinblastin and off the top of my head can't remember the second part of the protocol). We had one week vinblastin, the next week the other one and the third week off and then it went again. It is expensive. You need blood tests each week to make sure the white cell count is OK to have the chemo (there were weeks we could not do it)... Vitamin C is a huge tonic for dogs and if Ollie did get flat he spent a day at hospital on a drip with Vit C and he came home like a puppy.

Chemo does NOT make dogs sick. They don't lose all their hair (fur), they may lose a bit on their rump or tail where they sit but that is about it and it grows back as soon as the chemo stops.

The reason chemo does NOT make dogs sick is that they cannot give as much to a dog as they do with humans (in humans they bombard the whole system to kill off all the cancer cells and this kills good and bad cells, they do this because they can give us a bone marrow transplant if needed) - they can't transplant bone marrow for dogs, so they get a much lower dose over a longer period.

We still went to the park and played while he was on chemo - it won't hurt them and they are NOT toxic to other dogs and people...

Before we started chemo we contacted an holistic vet, our canine oncologist (Rob Straw in Brisbane) and our vet gave all the reports to the holistic vet so they could design a course of treatment that would keep Ollie well while he underwent chemo. At one stage he was taking about 15 tablets and supplements a day (we are down to much less but continue).

Ask your vet about antihistamines - MCT release histamine into the system and it looks like an allergic reaction - we use Polaramine from the chemist (Ollie has 2mg a day), this keeps the histamine at bay and we don't have any reactions.

Remove as many carbs from the diet as possible - carbs feeds cancer. Change the diet to organic if you can but if not then just normal human food will do. Ollie eats chicken, turkey, beef and kidney (occasionally) and some roo. He eats sweet potato or pumpkin and zucchini or other veg (just a few tablespoons of mushed up stuff with his meat every night). Some meat for breaky...

There is so much to tell you but I think I have given you enough to think about to start with - don't hesitate to PM me if you have any questions at all.

We are in Canberra and our oncologist was in Brisbane and our holistic vet is in Sydney - we liaised via phone, email and fax with all professionals sharing the info... The oncologist still can't believe Ollie is still here...

[Flealea]

Thank you so much for giving me a little more optimism. The vets have told me some of what you have gone over, but I wanted to hear it myself from other people.

Ripley will be on Vinblastine and possibly alternated with another medication to shrink the lymph node more.

I will look into the holistic vet.

Also, what on earth do you end up feeding if you need to avoid carbs? Obviously rice and pasta are out. Does than only leave proteins like meat? What about dairy like cottage cheese.

I will definately stay in touch as it would be great to share this with someone who's been through it.

Leanne

[Staffyluv]

Ollie's diet is mainly meat and veg (no pasta, rice etc). He also gets cottage cheese with some flax oil on it (he loves it), say a tablespoon of cheese and a teaspoon of flax as a treat. You have to supplement. he eats things like chicken, turkey roo, beef and kidney (occasionally) and he has fresh fish like tuna and yes I cave and give him half my salmon when we have it. He also loves yoghurt as a treat too.

I used to buy a BBQ each week to get him to take the pills and supplements because there were so many and trying to get him to just take them was hard on both of us. I just wrapped a couple of pills in a bit of chicken and he would swallow it no worries - he is used to it after nearly 4 year and I just ask him to open now and he takes them no worries. Cooking food is also important for cancer dogs - raw food can compromise their health (you will see all this in the cancer diets for dogs).

I do cheat - it is very hard to do the carb free thing as a human let alone with dogs. If you do a google search for anti cancer diet for dogs, they all say the same thing. But it is controlled cheating - he gets treats, he has cake on his birthday and if we have take away he might get a bit of pizza crust or a chicken nugget - they still have to enjoy life...

I am on here lots, so like I said stay in touch