Meet Hershey…

 Hershey is a 5 year old male neutered Chocolate Standard Poodle who presented in January of this year for blood in his eyes.  At that time, all of his lymph nodes were elevated but a fine needle aspirate of the lymph nodes came back inconclusive for cancer.  He had one of the lymph nodes on his neck removed and biopsied and was diagnosed with B-cell Lymphoma.

 Lymphoma is a cancer of the lymphatic system (immune system); there is no known cause.  It is one of the most common cancers that we see in dogs and cats, and is the most responsive to chemotherapy.  Survival time for pets that do not undergo chemotherapy is 4-8 weeks.  Remission, which is a period achieved with chemotherapy drugs where the pet shows no symptoms and the cancer has been reduced to an undetectable level, can be over a year!!!!  There is a 75% chance of remission and most pets show very little side effects to the chemotherapy.  Chemotherapy in pets differs from human chemotherapy in that we want to achieve remission status while maintaining a good quality of life.

 
Chemotherapy side effects are rare in dogs and cats because we use different doses when compared to people.  Rarely, vomiting, anorexia, or diarrhea can occur, usually 3-5 days after the injectable drugs.  This can be controlled with a bland diet and anti-nausea medicines and tends to resolve quickly.  In Poodles, like Hershey, and dogs with hair (shih tzus and malteses for example), we can see some hair loss since their hair continually grows like humans.  Low white cell counts are also common, so we always recheck these levels prior to administering the next dose to ensure that the immune system is healthy enough to handle the drugs.

Good news for Hershey, the B-cell lymphoma responds better to chemotherapy than T-cell.  Even though he had stage IV lymphoma, meaning all of his lymph nodes, liver, and spleen was involved, he is responding great to the chemotherapy.  His protocol includes a tapering dose of an oral steroid and intravenous chemo drugs on an alternating weekly or biweekly schedule.  He is on the third month of his five month course of chemotherapy and is back to his normal crazy-man self.  He gained back the 10# that he had lost and looks fantastic (as you can see from his handsome photos).