Advice appreciated: Sick Pomeranian.

[Brittany_Lynn]

My mom bought my siblings and myself a pomeranian (Foxy) from a breeder about 5 years ago for Christmas, however she is bonded the closest with my mom, so personally I consider her my mom's dog. Anyway, Foxy is intact because she was a bred (had one litter), and my mom had thoughts of having 1 litter of puppies that (thankfully) never panned out, but my mom never got her spayed anyway.
About a year ago, I noticed that Foxy had some lumps around her nipples, and I looked up some info online, and self-diagnosed her as having mastitis. My mom took Foxy to the vet, and his diagnosis was as follows:
Foxy had a false pregnancy, and because she didn't actually have any puppies, the milk that her hormones sent out is building up, and she is trying to lactate, but she doesn't have nursing puppies, so you have to stimulate that yourself to get rid of the lumps of milk.
Very well, we did and everything worked out fairly well. A few months ago, I noticed that the lumps had returned; my mother repeated the vet's previous diagnosis, but when I tried stimulating her this time, no milk came out. I was worried, but my mom kept shrugging me off. Eventually, however, the lumps became rock-hard, AND I noticed one that was no where near her nipples-it was up by her rib cage. My mom kept shrugging it off and kept saying she didn't have money to take Foxy to the vet, so eventually I saved up and made an appointment for my mom to take her (with my money...).
The vet's current diagnosis is as follows:
It is either breast cancer, or calcified milk in her milk ducts. Our options are as follows:
1. Do 3 separate surgeries on Foxy to remove the lumps. We cannot do 1 surgery because she is too small and apparently she doesn't have enough skin for him to remove all the lumps and then sew her back up.
The vet did not suggest this because "she is a very small dog, they don't do as well in major surgery, and also because she is so old" (10 years old)
2. Take a culture of the multiple lumps to figure out whether it was cancerous (then benign or malignant) or calcified milk, and then figure out our next step.
The vet did not suggest this because "sometimes when you stick the tumor with a needle, the cancer will get upset and start growing, even if it had been benign before."
(...apparently we don't want to poke the cancer because it will get an attitude and will maliciously decide to start growing again?)
3. Wait and see if her lumps get bigger over time. (Approximately 2-3 months).
This is what the vet suggested.

...My mom is afraid that if Foxy has surgery that she'll never come out of it, so she didn't push for that, and she didn't like what the vet said about the cancer "deciding to get worse if we pricked it", so she was happy to bring Foxy home and "wait it out" but I am very unhappy with this prognosis.
Any thoughts? Any one have something similar happen with their dogs/cats/larger animals?
Below are some pictures of my dear.

 

[Mandy]

I've got a friend whos mom has poms. She's bred them before, so I asked my friend about this.
So here's what she's telling me to tell you;
She said she'd go with option 2. [though you said the vet didn't want to do this?] She also said it seems like it'd be tumors, something about her mammary glands/milk, and also that you'd really want to get it tested to see if the lumps are cancer, because obviously you wouldn't want to wait as her being old and small.

She said she's heard about this before in a Pomeranian and is trying to remember..

We have an old Maltese who needs dental work.
We're going to get her work done, and we aren't too worried about the whole putting her under deal. She's 12 years old. I've been reading on other sites that people's dogs have done fine with this. (if this is what you are worried about- My friend has confused me with all the talking haha.)

[And also sorry, it posted before I was done.]

 

[Riven]

10 is not old for a little dog.

Since it does not sound like they are bothering her, I'd only worry about two options. Surgery, or not.

If you do the surgery you have the risks associated with surgery, putting them under, recover, secondary infection, etc.

Since she's not hurting or bothered by them you can just watch, and monitor her quality of life. She is an aging dog, their are added risks because it is an invasive surgery.

And if the world was perfect, vet care would be free, but there are costs added. Are you going to pay $1000 to have the surgery to have her never full recover? Would she fuller recover and then only have a year left. I know this sounds possibly cruel, but I personally, don't want to be kept alive if my quality of life is gone. I'm not scared of dying, I'm scared of being stuck living unable to move by myself, dress myself, or feed myself.

What you need to decide is how much life would the surgery possibly add? What would the quality of the life be, taking into consideration any lasting effects of what could go wrong. What is the poss. length of her life without it, what would it's quality probably be like?

I have a yorkie who is 13 this year, I won't sedate him for a dental because a year ago he had a stroke. He also has CHF. I don't feel the risk is worth it.

I'd rather have my dog have a shorter happier life, than a longer one filled with pain or complications.

This is tough decision for anyone, no one can give you the answer, you have to decide, we can offer things to think about and such, but remember at the end of the night you are the one who has to sleep with your decision, the vet bills, and the outcome. I'm going to guess if you had to save up for the vet visit, you're mom isn't going to pay anyway, and is it even something you can afford? I know that you love her too, but this is a choice that you have to make together I think.

A quick story, my mom and dad's dog had cancer, they didn't do surgery, but they watched.. they watched so long they had to carry her outside to potty, they couldn't let go. That is how my mom remembers her. She was a weimarner and was 14 years old, but out of all of those years, she only remembers the end. At age 10 I had my weim spayed, daughter of my mom's dog, she was getting senile and we didn't want her wondering off and getting bred, usually she would stay in the yard, but some days she'd wonder off and we'd have to go look for her, she wouldn't look when we called until we touched her, then she'd snap out of it. She didn't recover, but I got to remember her happy jumping in the car ready to go for a ride. I got to say good bye to her after the surgery, we knew she wasn't going to make it. Afterwards our vet told us she had cancer nodules all over her ovaries and uterus. If we hadn't tried the spay, we would've dealt with the cancer instead, it was a blessing in disguise. Chelsie was supposed to be my exes dog, but she turned out to be more of mine. She was my first dog I had that wasn't a family dog, for years she was our only child, then we got the yorkie. Then later she became a babysitter and friend for both of my daughters. Years have passed and we still miss her, but we get to remember her happy.

 

[Dolyphinm]

It is very possible to poke the tumors for a biopsy and for them to start to grow. My childhood dog Benji had a fatty tumor on his wrist/elbow...he had only 4 inch legs but a long big body and looked like someone chopped his legs off and shortened him lol. After a few years the vet had it retested. It grew to the size of being bigger than a tennis ball. He wasn't bother by it for the longest time and even still would run around when he felt like it. After it got to that size he would like at it, probably because of it stretching his skin out, but it didn't seem to bother him too much. The spot it was in on his leg had a lot of nerves and the Vet said it would be very risky to not cause any nerve damage if he didn't seem bothered by it. So it was just check for cancer periodically.

He was put down at the age of 16 after falling down the stairs and not being able to get back up. On x-rays he had 2 possible cancerous masses near his bladder and pelvis.

I also volunteer at a local SPCA. They do blood tests on all the older animals to make sure they can handle anesthesia. They pretty much all can handle it and are still altered at their further ages.

 

[fanofdmb84]

Our husky developed a tumor on her elbow. Our vet said the same thing--if they tried to remove it, it would likely grow back faster and bigger. We found out later that she also had a mass in/on her spleen, which eventually ruptured and led to her death. She was 13 at the time so we just made her comfortable.

Unfortunately I saw something very similar to your case with a friend of my mothers. She did not "believe" in spaying her cats, and both of them got mammary tumors, had extensive surgeries, and still died within a few months of the original diagnosis (and within weeks of each other). In her case, if she would have spayed the cats before their first heat cycle, they would probably still be alive and doing fine.

 

[Riven]

I know this doesn't help your case, because it was your mom's deal, but we didn't have Chelsie spayed young, we used to breed her. My parents raised weims, and we did to on a small scale. Cami, my weim who is out of Chelsie is 9, several years ago she developed kidney issues and she was high risk to spay. I bred her twice and both times it was too hard on her. Now everything we get that is something to be altered, we do right away. It really can prevent some issues in the future.

 

[Brittany_Lynn]

Just wanted to say quickly that I read all your posts, thank you for all the info and input. I will be back tomorrow after work for a longer response; short response is that after reading your stories, I might bring Foxy back to the vet myself to make him test her tumors/lumps to see what they are--I am still mad that he told my mom that he didn't want to do that, I understand it could make the tumors grow, but how will he know if it's a tumor OR calcified milk if he doesn't test it first? :impatient: Will write back more tomorrow. Thanks again everyone.

 

[addictedtochins]

Just wanted to say I'm sorry, she is such a cutie. I hope you get good results.

 

[Riven]

Will the answer of what exactly they are change the direction you will take? If not, I'd let it be.

A tumor should feel different than calcified milk.

I am concerned that the vet said she is too small for the surgery, if this is so she was way to small to be bred. Is she like 2 lbs or something? Also if there is enough skin to cover them now, there should be enough later.

I understand that you are very concerned, but have you had a heart to heart with your mom about this? If Foxy is more her dog, maybe she simply does not want to put her little friend through all of the surgeries. Did you talk to the vet yourself or was the information relayed through your mom?

Also if it is calcified ducts then it should show up on an x-ray. Calcified ducts is sometimes a pre-cursor to cancer, but is not always. So what will you benefit by finding out for sure either way?

I'm not trying to sound negative, but just trying to give you some questions to consider, only you can answer them honestly to your thoughts, but I think they can help you find the best path to take.

 

[LolaFox]

You could always go to another vet for a second opinion if you are unsatisfied with this prognosis. I have a pom myself but she is only 3 (almost 4) so she is not as old as yours, and she hasn't had this problem. She did have a luxating patella but it was fixed with surgery and she did just fine. She's about the size of your Foxy, maybe a little bigger. Hope everything is ok. She's beautiful.

 

[Brittany_Lynn]

Thanks for all the compliments, everyone.

Will the answer of what exactly they are change the direction you will take? If not, I'd let it be.
A tumor should feel different than calcified milk.
I am concerned that the vet said she is too small for the surgery, if this is so she was way to small to be bred. Is she like 2 lbs or something? Also if there is enough skin to cover them now, there should be enough later.
I understand that you are very concerned, but have you had a heart to heart with your mom about this? If Foxy is more her dog, maybe she simply does not want to put her little friend through all of the surgeries. Did you talk to the vet yourself or was the information relayed through your mom?
Also if it is calcified ducts then it should show up on an x-ray. Calcified ducts is sometimes a pre-cursor to cancer, but is not always. So what will you benefit by finding out for sure either way?
I'm not trying to sound negative, but just trying to give you some questions to consider, only you can answer them honestly to your thoughts, but I think they can help you find the best path to take.

I don't care how much it costs, as long as I can afford it...1000s is out of the price range, unfortunately.
Foxy weighs 8 pounds, she is 'otherwise very healthy' according the the vet.
The info was relayed through my mom, but she wrote some of the stuff down so I'm pretty confident in what she explained to me.

They didn't X-ray her, I think I'll take her back and ask them to do that, at the very least, and then see if they can tell if it's tumors or calcified ducts/milk. I'd like to know so that I know exactly what we're dealing with, if we should look into surgery, if these are just benign tumors/calcified milk, or if we should start preparing to make Foxy comfortable and give her the best care for the rest of her life. If it's a bad prognosis, lots of cancer or something, I'd like to know for that last reason and so that I can prepare myself and my mom and siblings. My mom will be heartbroken (as will all of us, but especially my mom) if anything happens to Foxy.

If Foxy is more her dog, maybe she simply does not want to put her little friend through all of the surgeries.

I know that is exactly what she's thinking right now...but I want to gauge what the better path is for the long run. If we can only have a year or two with Foxy and the choice is to be riddled with surgeries OR making her comfortable, okay, nix the surgery. If she needs this surgery to be on her way to 7 more great years, then please, let's do the surgery! I also don't know how to tell if the lumps are uncomfortable for her, I'd like for her to at least be comfortable in the interim.

Thanks again everyone! Love this forum.

 

[Riven]

You would notice discomfort by her licking, "biting", or itching at them, avoiding laying on them, things like that. Say if she normally lays on her belly, but has begun laying on her side to avoid laying on them, them that could be a sign of discomfort.

I would definately as the vet when you go back the total expected cost, not just of the surgery, but also the after care and any meds she would need, any special foods. When they give you the amount ask them if that is taking into account her not recovering quickly, needing extra stay time, etc. I know my local vet charges $45 a day just for "hospital" stays. Just make sure you get all of the information you can think of, and some vets will even honor a "quote" and say it will be this much. Sometimes it will run a bit higher, but then you know exactly what you're getting into. I don't know how many vets actually do that, but I know a couple who do.

This is a tough time, I don't envy you or your mother right now. Perhaps also your other siblings might pitch him to help pay for the vet bills. And remember to try to keep it a "family" decision and listen carefully to your mothers thoughts too. It's easy to get caught up in saving a pet, and lose site of the whole picture. We'd see it in the vet very often. Just remember to look at everything, and don't rush into a choice right now.

Good luck to you and Foxy.