Palliative treatment options for hypercalcaemia and anal sac tumour

RE: Palliative treatment options for hypercalcaemia and anal sac tumour

Michael Woodhouse — Sat, 17 Dec 2022 21:08:47 GMT

Erm, depomedrone is your friend here. Shrink tumour, increase calcium excretion. I'd expect pu/pd to reduce but not resolve. You need to see dog monthly and owner needs to do nothing

RE: Palliative treatment options for hypercalcaemia and anal sac tumour

Alistair Graham-Evans — Sat, 17 Dec 2022 10:09:49 GMT

Obviously discussion with the relative as well as the owner is the key here.

If anything permitted I would do simple chest X-ray and ultrasound medial iliac LNs.

If that clear then remove gland, if not then palliative with Pred to lower Ca. Could all be done in one day.

An example of so many options and cheapest not necessarily best and cheapest treatment could be false economy! So often we are treating the owner and the dog! If the owner is deteriorating then that would influence our treatment choices. Who would give any medication!? It’s hard. Obviously euthanasia is a valid option too but I bet the owner declines once the dog is gone.

A classic case where criticism is easy without knowing the details. And everyone with an internet connection has an opinion these days! Often there is no “right”choice

RE: Palliative treatment options for hypercalcaemia and anal sac tumour

Rob Loxley — Thu, 15 Dec 2022 11:21:40 GMT

I've had success with oral alendronic acid for various hypercalcemia cases - mainly primary hyperPTH that don't opt for surgery. In this case I'd also consider trying Palladia, or consider metronomic cyclophos/chloramb + meloxicam as palliative options.

If the dog can be brought in then staging and primary surgery could all be done on one day and the dog collected in the evening?

I PTS a couple of weeks ago a labrador with a unilateral adenocarcinoma that presented similarly with PUPD/hyperCa in February, though it wasn't losing lots of weight; they declined staging/surgery/chemo options, and had been maintained on meloxicam.