For the TLDR version, skip to the bottom!
As many of you may know, my dogs are like my kids. I am obsessed with them and will do almost anything for them. My last dog, Olive, had many medical challenges, including going through cancer twice. Once with surgical removal with clear margins and once with surgical removal and radiation. Having gone through all of that I had hoped my next dog would be very healthy. When I got Lottie in January of 2023 she was the picture of health. She was a wild crazy boxer mix who loved to box with her feet. She stayed very healthy (except for allergies!) until this past June.
At the end of June, Lottie started limping and when she hadn’t stopped after 4 days I took her to our vet, Animal Hospital of The Woodlands, where they did xrays. It was determined that she either had a bacterial infection in the bone, a fungal infection in the bone, or bone cancer, specifically osteosarcoma, in her left wrist (you can see where it is misshapen in the photo below). Upon finding out that news I didn’t let myself do any googling right away but once I did, I felt very strongly that she probably had osteosarcoma. At this point she was still using her paw but limping a little and was in pain if pressure was put on the joint. It was recommended that we go to Gulf Coast Veterinary Specialists to have a bone biopsy done. I have tons of history with GCVS because my last pup, Olive had been a patient there a few times; for cancer and for a dermoid sinus.
I got Lottie scheduled in to see a surgeon, who would perform the biopsy, in their first available appointment which was 9 days after her initial x-rays. At that appointment the surgeon shared that there was a cheaper and less invasive test that we could do first, a fine needle aspiration. We chose to go ahead with that and they were able to do it the same day. After waiting and waiting for those results, they came back inconclusive. So we scheduled an appointment for the surgical biopsy. The biopsy was again scheduled in their first available appointment which was 30 days after the initial x-rays.
The biopsy was basically a full surgery with stitches and a cone. After surgery she was very leery of using her paw at all and was clearly in pain. These tests would take longer to come back because the bone would need to be de-calcified and the fungal tests take weeks. As we were getting towards two weeks out form the biopsy, Lottie’s pain was getting worse and worse. She was not using her leg at all anymore and if she did accidentally use it, she would cry out in pain. Sometimes she would be shaking and crying and needed major consoling to finally calm down after. It was heart breaking. At this point I felt like amputation might be the best option because of her pain level and because of how aggressive osteosarcoma is. I reached out to our local vet and asked tons of questions and the vet agreed that amputation was probably the best option at this point. We would then send her entire limb off for testing to make sure we knew what was wrong.
A few days after I had that discussion with our vet, we had a follow up appointment at GCVS. Some of Lottie’s results were finally in. The cancer test was inconclusive AGAIN, but she did not have a bacterial infection. The fungal culture was not complete and it hadn’t grown anything yet, however at this point it probably would not. They recommended amputation as well. They sent over an estimate for me to compare to my local vet. The local vet was less than half the cost of GCVS, so we went ahead and scheduled with our vet. Finally, 55 days after that first x-ray, she would be on her way to being pain free, and we would finally have an answer as to what was going on. Video below is from a few days before amputation.
She stayed at the vet overnight following the surgery and came home around 5 pm the following day. She came home with 40 staples in her shoulder and a sort of Texas longhorn shaped incision. I got her some shirts from PetSmart and sewed the left arm hole closed so that she could be cone free and couldn’t scratch at the staples with her back foot.
The recovery was rough for Lottie. She hadn’t been using her leg prior to removing it, so she did well in terms of movement but her mental health was a mess. She has always been a very sensitive girl, and this exacerbated it. She ended up going on anti anxiety meds because she seemed to be having panic attacks, which I didn’t even know that dogs could have! The weekend following her surgery (about 5 days out) was particularly rough as she basically refused to move. She laid in the exact same place for over 12 hours and only moved because I made her sleep in a pen while I slept on the couch. This continued for about 4 days and finally she started to improve! I started seeing more of her feisty personality and a willingness to interact with the world.
Two weeks after surgery she had her staples removed and then a few days later we FINALLY got results back. She does have osteosarcoma. Based on my research I had thought she would have 9-12 months to live if it was osteosarcoma. So I was very glad to hear from the vet that with chemotherapy, some dogs can live an additional 4 years. (I found this article extremely helpful.) Our vet has an oncologist on call, so they created a chemo plan for Lottie: six doses of Carboplatin with one given every 3 weeks. During her biopsy, they took chest x-rays and confirmed that at that point she did not have any signs of metastasis in her lungs, which is usually the main concern. Osteosarcoma can metastasize in other ways but the lungs are the most common. So we will do x-rays at least twice more to confirm that they are still clear while we are doing chemo. And then she’ll have x-rays every 4-6 months for the rest of her life.
Lottie has just completed her first round of chemo and she tolerated it really well! She seemed more lethargic than normal and wasn’t really interested in food, but she was still happy. When I picked her up from chemo, she danced around and was super bouncy, just like old Lottie would have been.
She is settling into the tri-pawd life pretty well. I’ve learned that on walks, a very fast walk is best so that she doesn’t have to hop as much and can have a nice galloping rhythm. She’s learning how to play with her toys again and how to chew bones. Her cousin, Willow, even came over to play, which is another thing she has to relearn how to do. She used to always smack other pups around with her front feet while playing, but she can’t do that anymore. Hopefully she will continue to tolerate the chemo well and it will knock out this cancer so that we can have a few more years together!!
TLDR: Lottie has bone cancer, osteosarcoma, and had to have her front left leg amputated. She is undergoing chemo which should give her a few more years of life. She is settling well into tri-pawd life and is back to being more of her silly self.
Jenna, you are such a good “dog mom” . No pup has had better love and care.
Thank you for sharing the process with us.
Love and Hugs to darling Lottie from her great aunt Bewaria