# Mast cell tumor



## gaddyshooter (Oct 12, 2003)

Just wondering if anyone else has an experience with their dogs getting what my vet called a mast cell tumor. I have a 9 year old YLF, and it is a mass on her right front paw, between the toes. She says that she should remove the mass and send it to a lab to have it tested to see if it is cancer or not, then determine what, if any more treatment would be needed. Now, the estimate she gave me is 680.00 dollars just for the removal, then aditional fees for the labratory testing. Seems a bit much to me. Just wondering if anyone else has any experience with this, or any Vets possibly on here. Thanks for any help or advise.


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

Id call around that sounds high to me. Vet prices vary quite a bit.

One thing about tumors there isn't many practical things you can do if the dog has cancer. I would ask waht the prognosis of the dog is if you have it removed and it is cancer.

If the treatment is prohibitively expensive and not going to save the dog anyway whats the point.

Tumors are hard to remove on feet also because their is so little skin left to sew it back up.

Talk to a few vets just like you would talk to a few doctors, opinions are cheap, like mine :wink: .

Good luck

heres what I do

Buy the following Vitamins and supplements

E 400 iu 
B complex 
C 1000mg 
A 10,000 iu 
Zinc 50 mg 
Co Q10 150 mg 
Fish oil 1000mg 
selinium 200 mg 
Quercetin 800 mg combined with Bromelain 200mg 
Proanthocyanidin 100mg 
calcium250mg and magnesium 155 mg combined

Purchase them at your local GNC or what ever good health food store is in your area

Buy as many of these in capsule form as possible so you can just open the capsules, then buy a case of canned dog food ( I buy mine at Sams club)

Place one can of food in your wifes blender and empty the contents of the capsules in it then get two spoons and crush the pills that are not capsules and dump them in also ( if you rock the spoons softly it works best when crushing pills to powder rather than just applying a lot of pressure which tends to make them pop out of between the spoons).

Next take a small sissors and open the vit A,E, and fish oil liquid capsules and pour the ingredients in. I feed the dog the capsule skins manually, but that not necessary they just beg for them because of the oil I guess.

Liquify the mixture and feed it once a day to your dog. You should see a big improvement in about two weeks. ( for tumors I do this twice daily for the first 10 days)

This is a wide spectrum antioxidant mix that I have successfully used to cure three dogs of cancerous tumors ( they went away in just about a week to ten days). All three dogs lived years after the treatment one is still hunting with me and is laying at my feet as I type this. Current veterinary medicine offers little help for cancerous tumors in dogs.

The bottom line is the body cures itself and this concoction provides it with the fuel needed to do so. I'm not making any guarantees but it has worked on two of my dogs and one of my friends all of which the vets told us would die soon and lived many heathly years after.

By the way I take this same mix daily, and have for years Sans the can of dog food! . I haven't been sick or had a cold in the last 10 years not once, which is a feat in a houshold with 5 kids in school. IF you take this daily and when you feel a cold coming one immediately up the Vitamin a dosage to 50,000 iu for 2 consecutive days ( do not continue this high Vit A dose any longer than than 2 days, go back to 10,000 iu daily after the two days of high dosage) you will never have a cold or the symptoms will be so minimal as to be no problem.

It seem complicated but the hardest part is convincing your wife to let you use the blender to mix dog food , I just rinse it out with hot water and pour the water over my other dogs food, then put it in the dish washer. She got over it.....


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## gaddyshooter (Oct 12, 2003)

Thanks Bob for the advise. I haven't quite made my mind up what I am going to do. We are talking to another Vet who is going to look at it and possibly just cut the mass open and drain whatever is in it and sew it back up. The thing is, the vet the other day even says if it is cancer there isn't much they can do, short of removing the whole foot. But she then says, which I have read on the internet also, that most mast cell tumors are not cancerous, but she says they can't tell me if it is or not without removing it and sending it to the labratory. Anyway, thanks for the help Bob.


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## Bigdog (Aug 13, 2003)

They can't take a biopsy with a needle to examine for cancer? I agree with Bob that the cost sounds a bit high. I had a lab with a cancerous mast cell tumor on his head. Went through 3 surgeries and 9 months of Chemo before success.


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## gaddyshooter (Oct 12, 2003)

Yeah, I think I may have missed something in the discussion with my Vet. I did have my 6 year old daughter there with me, so it wasn't the quietest examining room at the place. Women. But I digress. She had the same type of thing on her foot when she was only a couple of years old that cost around 250.00 or so to have treated. They just cut it open and drained it that time and there were no problems with it. The vet did do a needed extraction and look at the cells under a microscope but she did not say it was cancer. I think I will call them back, and seek another opinion on it as well. Thanks guys.


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## Bigdog (Aug 13, 2003)

I don't recall that one can actually drain a mast cell tumor. I researched this an awful lot back in 2002. Digging back here is a brief overview on Mast Cell tumors.
Malignant mast cell tumors can spread to the lymph nodes, spleen, liver and bone marrow. Mast cell tumors are among the most common tumors of dogs, accounting for approximately 20 percent of all skin tumors. The cause of mast cell tumors is unknown.

Dogs that develop mast cell tumors often are older (usually 8 to 9 years of age), although they can occur in dogs of all ages.

What to Watch For

Round, raised masses in the skin

Lack of appetite

Vomiting

Abdominal pain

Black tarry stools due to bleeding in the upper intestinal tract

Diagnosis

Diagnostic tests are needed to recognize mast cell tumors and exclude other diseases that may cause similar symptoms. Tests may include:

A complete medical history and thorough physical examination

Needle aspiration of the mass and any enlarged lymph nodes. The aspirated material is expelled onto a glass slide and submitted to the laboratory for cytologic evaluation by a veterinary pathologist.

A complete blood cell count (hemogram or CBC) to evaluate for anemia, low platelet count, or signs of inflammation. Rarely, circulating mast cells are found in animals with systemic mast cell disease.

A serum biochemistry profile to evaluate your dog's general health and to assess any effects of the mast cell tumor on other body systems

A urinalysis to evaluate kidney function and check for urinary infection

A buffy coat smear of blood to look for rare circulating mast cells

X-rays of the abdomen to evaluate liver and spleen size

Abdominal ultrasound, if further evaluation of the liver and spleen is needed to detect masses and abnormal tissue densities within the spleen or liver; X-rays usually only show generalized enlargement.

A fine needle aspirate and cytologic evaluation of the bone marrow, if widespread mast cell disease is suspected

A fine needle aspirate and cytologic evaluation of the spleen, if splenic mastocytoma is suspected.

Surgical removal of a suspicious skin tumor followed by histopathologic evaluation by a veterinary pathologist (excisional biopsy); this may be curative for small, well-differentiated mast cell tumors of skin provided a wide surgical excision is performed.

Treatment

Treatment for mast cell tumors may include one or more of the following:

Wide surgical excision (removal) of a well-differentiated mast cell tumor of the skin

Radiation therapy for local control of a less well-differentiated skin tumor

Chemotherapy in selected cases

Home Care and Prevention

Your dog should be examined by a veterinarian if you notice any mass on his skin. A fine needle aspirate or surgical biopsy can be performed to identify the nature of the mass. Most skin tumors in dogs are benign, but early detection and treatment of malignant tumors, especially mast cell tumors, can dramatically affect your pet's long-term prognosis.


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