Tatura Veterinary Group Pet of the Season - Spring 2009

Ellie, a very sweet natured seven year-old Boxer, first presented at Tatura Vet Clinic in June with a suspicious looking lump on her left hind leg.

Ellie’s owner thought it was simply a callous from Ellie lazing about on the veranda all day soaking up the sunshine!

Dr Brett extracted some cells from the lump and checked them under the microscope to see if they contained anything to worry about.  Unfortunately, Ellie’s lump contained a number of “mast cells”.  These particular cells were not good news and Ellie was booked in for surgery to remove the lump the following day.

Ellie is a lucky Boxer, because unlike some older Boxers, she did not have a heart murmur, which would increase her anaesthetic risk. To further assess her anaesthetic risk, routine pre-anaesthetic blood were run at the clinic.
When Ellie was anaesthetised for surgery, Dr Jill gave her a thorough check and found two more spots that would be removed at the same time as the main lump.  As these lumps were potentially “mast cell tumours,” a large margin of skin had to be removed from the lump site.  Ellie’s nasty lumps were removed successfully, however because of the large amount of skin that needed to be removed, stitching the wound together posed a minor problem.  Thankfully, Dr Jill was able to pull the leg skin together enough to suture up the wound. 

The offending tumours were sent off to pathology and the results came back with moderately bad news and a little bit of good news.  Mast Cell tumours are graded as 1, 2 and 3, with a grade 3 tumour being the most aggressive.  Ellie’s tumour was a grade 2 although there were certain factors about this tumour that made Ellie’s prognosis quite good with regular vet checks.

A couple of weeks later and sutures removed, Ellie was running and jumping around as usual and Ellie’s owner had learnt a valuable lesson about getting anything unusual on her dog checked out. 

Approximately one month later, Ellie was back with another suspicious lump that was removed immediately.  No chances were being taken with this one.  This surgery was much easier as the lump was small and just under her left armpit where there was plenty of loose skin that made it much easier to stitch up.  Ellie has since had the stitches removed and is back to her daily walks with her Pug brother, Tyrone.  Ellie’s owner is now very vigilant about checking Ellie for any abnormal lumps and with this kind of close attention, we can treat anything that may arise before it becomes a problem. 

Here at Tatura Vet Clinic, we feel that by keeping a close eye on Ellie, she should be able to enjoy her daily runs around the golf course for a few more years yet!   

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