Anaplastic Sarcoma Under Eye

[Archerlove]

Hello urgently seeking any advice which may help our 18 month old Labrador.She developed a swelling beneath her eye 10 days ago which has been diagnosed as an anaplastic sarcoma, a malignant aggressive cancer .Of course we are in shock and are exploring all avenues to help her.She is otherwise healthy and normal at the moment .

[Staffyluv]

Sorry for your news and unfortunately I cannot assist with this other than to say, as the owner of a dog who survived many years more than the text books suggested, research, research and more research.

What does your vet suggest as treatment?

Surgery would be the first option, if possible. You would hope for clean margins and a low grading of the tumour.

Chemo/radiation can be expensive (prohibitively so for some people).

Chemo does not affect dogs like it does people - they do not get sick and lose all their fur. They cannot be given the large doses that it requires to kill all the cancer cells (as this also kills off many good fast dividing cells like bone marrow - bone marrow translpants are relatively new to the canine world and I would assume expensive).

If you are not sure, get a second opinion and also ask to be referred to a canine oncologist (we used Rod Straw in Brisbane but we are located in Canberra - ours was a telephone/email referral).

Diet plays a huge role in cancer patients - the right diet can add years of extra quality life to a terminally ill patient. I suggest you check out the local holistic vets in your area (we used All Natural Vet Care in Sydney - again, telephone and email).

Research and diet are the key in my opinion - the more you know about the type of cancer your dog has, the better.

Good luck

Jodie

[dogbesotted]

I second Jodies comments. My lucinda survived well past the prognosis of a few days to weeks to say goodbye. Lucinda was also holistically treated by the wonderful vets at All Natural Vet Care in Sydney.. also by Telephone email and discussion with Luindas primary vet

Good Luck and dont FORGET TO ENJOY EACH MOMENT OF EACH DAY JUST LIKE YOUR LAB IS DOING

h

[Archerlove]

I second Jodies comments. My lucinda survived well past the prognosis of a few days to weeks to say goodbye. Lucinda was also holistically treated by the wonderful vets at All Natural Vet Care in Sydney.. also by Telephone email and discussion with Luindas primary vet

Good Luck and dont FORGET TO ENJOY EACH MOMENT OF EACH DAY JUST LIKE YOUR LAB IS DOING

h

Thank you thank you thank you for replying.ATM we are awaiting appointment with an oncologist on Tuesday at SASH. We live in Sydney.

I`ve already been trawling internet( and resding Staffyluvs story) in a bid to help our beloved girl.I`ve switched diet from normal dry dog food to fresh meat, rice etc.Luckily she loves fruit too.She is currently perectly normal bar a hugely distended left eye. I cannot believ that a swift death is approaching. We willmdo eveything we can to help her.

[Staffyluv]

The rice in the diet needs to be reviewed. The standard rule for an anti cancer diet is carbs feed cancer so you will want to remove as much as possible.it is also better if it has plenty of good fats.

The Internet has many anti cancer diets for dogs just google it. Although I found it overwhelming so contacted our holistic vet to help design a diet suitable for Ollie.

[Archerlove]

The rice in the diet needs to be reviewed. The standard rule for an anti cancer diet is carbs feed cancer so you will want to remove as much as possible.it is also better if it has plenty of good fats.

The Internet has many anti cancer diets for dogs just google it. Although I found it overwhelming so contacted our holistic vet to help design a diet suitable for Ollie.

I am looking on net but out of interest what `fillers` did you use instad of carbs/rice?

[Staffyluv]

The rice in the diet needs to be reviewed. The standard rule for an anti cancer diet is carbs feed cancer so you will want to remove as much as possible.it is also better if it has plenty of good fats.

The Internet has many anti cancer diets for dogs just google it. Although I found it overwhelming so contacted our holistic vet to help design a diet suitable for Ollie.

I am looking on net but out of interest what `fillers` did you use instad of carbs/rice?

Veges - lots of them.

Ollie's diet was mainly cooked free range meat (or at least human grade - no pet mince). Cooked due to chemo and we did not want him getting ill from raw meat products with a lowered immune system. Cooked and raw veg (carrot, sweet potato, pumpkin, zucchini, squash, broccoli, cauliflower, really whatever I shopped for). He had cottage cheese, yoghurt, eggs, flax oil or fish oil supplements, vitamin C (about 1000mg a day). He liked fruit as a treat or frozen chicken stock (homemade)...

There is a whole lot of diet info out there for anti cancer diets but your holistic vet can offer so much more as they will be treating the dog based on what type of cancer, treatment and other medications.

Ollie also took the following supplements:

Anti-Ox, Lymphodran, Five Mushroom drops, a few different chinese herbs (only while he was having chemo).

He had some arsenica drops and a few other different drops from time to time, depending on what was going on with him.

The type and duration of his chemo damaged his thyroid, so he ended up on Thyroxine after he finished chemo. But the chemo bought him a lot more time with us as well as quality time too.

There is good and bad in all of the treatments but I truely believe that he had such quality of life due to the holistic treatment and quantity due to the chemo...

It is never easy and in our case very expensive but we all do what we can for our dogs.

[Archerlove]

The rice in the diet needs to be reviewed. The standard rule for an anti cancer diet is carbs feed cancer so you will want to remove as much as possible.it is also better if it has plenty of good fats.

The Internet has many anti cancer diets for dogs just google it. Although I found it overwhelming so contacted our holistic vet to help design a diet suitable for Ollie.

I am looking on net but out of interest what `fillers` did you use instad of carbs/rice?

Veges - lots of them.

Ollie's diet was mainly cooked free range meat (or at least human grade - no pet mince). Cooked due to chemo and we did not want him getting ill from raw meat products with a lowered immune system. Cooked and raw veg (carrot, sweet potato, pumpkin, zucchini, squash, broccoli, cauliflower, really whatever I shopped for). He had cottage cheese, yoghurt, eggs, flax oil or fish oil supplements, vitamin C (about 1000mg a day). He liked fruit as a treat or frozen chicken stock (homemade)...

There is a whole lot of diet info out there for anti cancer diets but your holistic vet can offer so much more as they will be treating the dog based on what type of cancer, treatment and other medications.

Ollie also took the following supplements:

Anti-Ox, Lymphodran, Five Mushroom drops, a few different chinese herbs (only while he was having chemo).

He had some arsenica drops and a few other different drops from time to time, depending on what was going on with him.

The type and duration of his chemo damaged his thyroid, so he ended up on Thyroxine after he finished chemo. But the chemo bought him a lot more time with us as well as quality time too.

There is good and bad in all of the treatments but I truely believe that he had such quality of life due to the holistic treatment and quantity due to the chemo...

It is never easy and in our case very expensive but we all do what we can for our dogs.