Amber is a seven year old Labrador Cross dog who does regular hospital visits, where her gentle and lovely nature no doubt brightens the day of many patients.
She was playing happily one recent Friday morning at the park; running, jumping, chasing -all the good stuff- but her energy levels evaporated quite suddenly on the walk home and she became weak and sluggish.
Amber was taken straight to the vet clinic where it was seen her gums were very pale, indicating a likely drop in blood pressure (blood provides the normal healthy pink colour of gum tissue).
Her tummy felt tense and a bit swollen so an X-Ray was taken which showed the normal abdominal contents (intestines, kidneys etc) were blurred out by an abnormal build-up of fluid in the abdomen.
As an X-Ray can’t distinguish between different fluid types (pus/blood/water/urine), a needle was carefully inserted into her abdomen and a syringe was used to suck some of that fluid out.
Once her condition had stabilised, exploratory surgery was performed, as a bleeding tumour (growth) was the likely cause, resulting in the removal of a tumour on the spleen weighing in at an impressive 3kg!
Amber made a speedy recovery and is back doing her hospital visits.
Although there was no evidence of any more tumours growing internally there is still a risk that tumours like this could recur elsewhere in the body. However, Amber’s owners are very positive and Amber herself certainly doesn’t give the possibility a second thought.
By the Welcome Bay Vet Clinic Team
We write for Bay Waka to share interesting and educational cases with the community.
