Doxie has a new bump

[P3tm0m]

I feel like a bad mommy I accidently picked Doxie up wrong last night and noticed a new bump on him-it feels like a water balloon-right in his leg area. I usually don't pick him up in that area, but when I felt it, I at first thought is he that fat, but then I noticed there wasn't one on the other side. I'm assuming it's another fatty tissue tumor, but off to the vet we go on Thursday. I hope that's what it is!!

[fairlight]

You're probably right P3. This usually happens in older dogs. Some vets say to remove them, others say to leave them alone. You can always get it aspirated to see if it is cancerous, but I can remember Deb telling me the story of how in one of her dogs they aspirated and the test came back negative but she still wanted the lump taken off of her dog. Sure enough the lump was cancerous.

See what your vet has to say and keep us posted.

[Dauxside]

Poor bub, all paws Xed that it's just a fatty tumor - Wu gets them a lot and it always scares me blue.

[Deb's Tiny Dogs]

Originally Posted by fairlight

You're probably right P3. This usually happens in older dogs. Some vets say to remove them, others say to leave them alone. You can always get it aspirated to see if it is cancerous, but I can remember Deb telling me the story of how in one of her dogs they aspirated and the test came back negative but she still wanted the lump taken off of her dog. Sure enough the lump was cancerous.

See what your vet has to say and keep us posted.

What Fair says is true. I would at a minimum have it aspirated. I choose to have them removed due my horrible experience. Though I think any good vet would accurately read the aspirated sampling correctly. I don't think the vet we were seeing at the time was the brightest bulb in the chandelier!

I just wrote in a separate post that Bogey is really prone to lumps of all kinds. I've made the following changes with amazing success:

• changed his diet removing all grains. Innova Evo is a great one. I use Urban Wolf which is a mix (you add your own protein)
• our homeopathic vet says lipoma's are caused by digestive stagnation in the body. Traditional vets treat them as a nuisance, but they are an indication of an underlying problem. She put him on some herbs to reduce/eliminate the stagnation. We stopped the herbs for three months as a test and he got three lipoma's in that time period. He went back on herbs and they have all significantly shrunken (is that a word?)
• added a probiotic/prebiotic to his food. The one she likes best is called I-flora. This also helps with digestion.
• I'm just starting to add another homeopathic herb called Thuja to his food. There's a fantastic article in 12/07 issue of Whole Dog Journal about how homeopathy works and it highly endorses Thuja as a lipoma preventative. You can get it at most natural foods stores. We'll see how it works.

[fairlight]

Thanks Deb for giving the acurate details. I knew one of your dogs had the problem but could not remember which one it was.

[alimel]

Deb, this is great information. Mel is prone to lumps and bumps and has many fatty tumors. He cannot undergo surgery so hopefully I can reduce them or keep more from forming with the information you provided.

[Deb's Tiny Dogs]

I just want to add that in the WDJ article on Lipoma's there was controversy on if they should be removed or not when diagnosed as benign.

Thoughts from the article (I've paraphrased a bit):


"The risk of removing the growth surgically is that it leaves the uncured disease to manifest itself at a deeper level, in a different form. From a homeopathic perspective, when you remove a growth, you stimulate the vital force to greater activity. You can't cure an apple tree of growing apples by cutting off its branches. In fact, you might spur it to blossom even more profusely"

*Note: per the article, once a lipoma has been confirmed benign, the cancer worry ends there: Lipomas cannot "turn" cancerous.

Another opinion:

"While having them aspirated appears to be suggested, I remove them when they are in a compromising position impeding movement or behind a nasal cavity obstructing breathing. Lipoma's have their own finite capsule - you just scoop them out. I use a technique during such surgeries to roughen the tissue area around the lipoma, creating an imflamatory response. This creates scar tissue that prevents the lipoma from growing back - on that spot st least"

And another - and one to which I'm am deeping convinced:

"Holistic medicine doesn't see diseases as unrelated entities that swoop in to disrupt health like so many flying monkeys at Oz. Instead, disease - or any disruption of the body's functioning, no matter how seemingly mild, like lipomas - is a manifestation of a weakness within the body itself. In other words, there's a Wicked Witch of the West working in the backdrop working as a dispatcher. Simply put, lipomas are a sign that there are deeper issues behind the scenes."

Traditional medicine mainly treats symptoms, Holistic medicine treats underlying causes. For my dogs, I use a blend, but lean towards a holistic approach whenever possible/practical.