Update 5/28--Karl passed on today. He began coughing and unable to breathe very well at times. We'd be on walks and he would just stop and stand there. I noticed a bony growth behind his left arm on his rib cage. Whenever he would jump down from the car seat, he would wince, so thinking that was causing pain. On Saturday I fished out his prescription from his amputation and gave him Tramadols which I could tell took some of the edge so he could at least get comfortable. I had a mobile euthanasia veternarian come to the house and I highly recommend that. He just passed on his favorite spot on the couch between my son and I.

So 8 months after the amputation. If I had caught his bone cancer when he first started limping last summer it would have been longer. I wouldn't give the last 8 months we had back for anything but I didn't forget how difficult the decison to amputate was.

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My buddy, Karl, 10 year old black and tan counhound mix,  has been lame on his right leg on and off for about a month and got x-rays and visited a vet oncologist and confirmed today it is osteosarcoma that has eaten away at the bone right below the knee.

Amputation was recommended to ease the pain and slow down the spreading. I went ahead and scheduled for next week. I guess chemo will be considered avter the surgery but prognosis is only an average life expectancy of 6 months.

He's been with me seven years and has been a great dog. Any experiences and/ or advice is appreciated!

Everything you do, do in the best interest of your pooch, not for you. It is not so easy to do this sometimes.

Good luck with everything, 4 legged buddies are the best.

It's definitely not easy, keep them as comfortable as possible with quality of life, and how stoic they can be while in pain. Even with my dog's lower legbone where it meets the knee has lost alot of structure, the only sign is him putting less pressure on it when he walks.

I asked the specialist vet straight up her thoughts of putting him down now, and she said that is very unnecessary.

Thank you.

That sucks but 6 months after chopping it off dosent seem worth it if it was one of my pets i would probably put them down

Your allegies are about to go into overload:

http://www.biscuitfilmworks.com/737/noam-murro-subaru-dream-weekend/

Do you remember this Subaru commercial (linked above) from last year? 

I have 1 tripod, who is one of my two greyhounds that were injured while training for the racetrack.

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He was just a year old when he finally lost the leg, and while he blossomed once unburdened of his withered right front leg, it took a long time for him to really recover. I recall him still occassionally experiencing site specific pain 6 months after a well-done surgery. He has a lot of heart and that made up for a lack of stamina as he adapted to a bouncing gait while walking.

If he was much older, and it was cancer threatening a taking of his leg, any time we gained from an amputation surgery was just because of me being selfish.

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I was in this same boat a few years ago.  My 13 year old female lab was limping on her right front leg.  X-ray showed a tumor in the upper arm bone.  Biopsy came back positive.  Vet said:

1.  Do nothing except pain killers, expect 0-3 months to live.
2. Chemo-expect 3-6 months.
3. Remove the leg and do chemo-expect 6-12 months.

Putting your dog through that much suffering to just get a few months seems pretty selfish to me.  I've never seen anyone going through chemo that seemed happy to me.  I ended up doing option 1.  I was ready to call the vet the moment she seemed like to it was time.  She defied all expectations and lived for two more years before I had to make the call.   I gave her the meds daily, then slowly cut back on them as she felt better.  I made sure she got to do as much of the fun stuff she loved to do and got plenty of the love she gave us!  

No one can make the call for you, but if the bone is already that bad, seems like chances are it's already spread to other parts of their body.

Thanks for the replies, since they found a nodule in his chest, the advantage to the amputation is the bone has a much higher chance of breaking,  I'm going to talk to the vet again before deciding on the procedure. And yes I remember the Subaru commercial, I thought it was great then, now it's like yeah, make the list.

Sorry

My Great Dane came up with the same deal.  Limping, took her to the vet, X-ray, bone cancer.

The "solution" as you say was amputation, chemo and maybe 6-18 months

For a 10 year old Great Dane in the winter.

There's no way I could put my buddy thru that.  Called the wife and had her leave work and come to the vet (bawling all the way) and we put him out of his misery.

It was dammed hard, but it was the right thing for Goliath.

Bozeman, man, sorry for your loss.

Either way is valid. I thought about it all weekend and had the amputation done last week. And it has been tough. Yesterday had the drainage tubes removed. This site is what kept me going in that direction: http://tripawds.org/

Here is right after, the swelling has gone down since. He is hopping around but sometimes he doesn't want to get up, I have to help him to get him outside to do his business.



The thing it did open my eyes to was their diet, I was feeding them crappy food.

I went through a 8 month cancer ordeal with my 11 yo Beagle Willie
It is hart breaking.
He had a tumor in his ear canal/side of head.
tried 4 different chemo treatments. the first would work to some degree, then the second coarse would not work, so we would try something else.
In the end the tumor made it were he could no longer eat.
Thats when I had to make that decision.  

I love my boy. Its been 14 months, and just got another beagle 2 months ago.
Having another beagle in the house makes me miss him more.

He took the treatments very well. I had major concerns, but I would do chemo again if in a similar situation.

Its a tough call.
As long as my boy had the will to keep going we kept going. ( i sold stuff it took me years to collect, guns, parts ect to help pay for vet bills and meds)(and would do the same again)
God Bless

One month after the operation, he's doing well, can even run a bit.

God Bless. I have decided not to have chemo for my dog. It's time to let it ride, I look at this time he has as a bonus.

He really looks like he is getting around pretty well

This. Went through the osteosarcoma with my last pup. We didn’t treat and she got about 6-7 months before we put her down. The few people I found that went with amputation and chemo said they 100% regretted it. 


Eta: shoulda looked at dates on these posts. 

He’s looking pretty good! 

Most dogs don’t live past 12 years old, so if I had a 10 year old dog with cancer then I’d almost definitely choose to euthanize so they didn’t have to spend their remaining time suffering.

Sorry OP.

One of my Great Danes had the same issue at four, vet said maybe a year after amputation, we could not put her through the trauma for only a year.

Sorry op.

I just had to put my buddy Ranger, a 7 year old golden, down on Monday due to bone cancer.  It sucks.

He really is.

To some other posts, after a couple of weeks of healing, they adapt very well. The tumor/ pain is gone, so they aren't suffering. My dog has to use his nub to pop his rear hips up to stand up, it takes a few seconds and that is frustrating to them but it's not painful. I had to change the layout of rooms and add some non-slip runners on floors with no carpet, if they slip on 3 legs they will go down, and he slips quick on linoleum and hardwood floors.

Sorry for your loss.

This is awesome to see. He looks to be in pretty good spirits to me!

I have always know that I could be friends with anyone who keeps a tripod or an old grey faced dog.  Their compassion for their friend/dog is all I need to know.

Hey! Hi!

Monte, Trip (as in Tripoli) and I are all playing “bachelor” this week. What time is dinner?


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I had a yellow Lab that had to have her right front leg removed.
She kind of hopped around the house but when it came time to run she could still run like Carl Lewis.  She even caught a squirrel running on three legs!
She lasted about 4-5 years after the amputation.  Great dog, I still miss her, and she died in 2009.

GSPatton that's pretty cool, my other dog with four legs would give one of her legs to catch any ground critter, but she tries to no avail.

The tri-pawd is doing good, has been having a blast sprinting in the snow. I need to post a video. No chemo just a much better diet, and lots of regular exercise.

Had a cat get BC in her left front leg.  Had it amputated, did not do any chemo.  She got about 1 more year of quality life before I felt she was suffering and had her put down.  The BC came back this time on her rib cage.

Six month mark this week. No chemo. We're into bonus time. Besides occaisional coughing he is doing  good, Decent appetite and likes to go on walks and trails.

Yeah, just waiting to see where it comes back.

RIP Buddy. He began coughing and unable to breathe very well at times. We'd be on walks and he would just stop and stand there. I noticed a bony growth behind his left arm on his rib cage. Whenever he would jump down from the car seat, he would wince, so thinking that was causing pain. On Saturday I fished out his prescription from his amputation and gave him Tramadols which I could tell took some of the edge so he could at least get comfortable. I had a mobile euthanasia veternarian come to the house and I highly recommend that. He just passed on his favorite spot on the couch between my son and I.

Condolences OP, RIP Pup.

So sorry, Alembic.

Karl was a lucky dog, and you're both lucky to have known each other.

Sorry to hear about your buddy Karl.  Remember that he was the lucky one to have a good human to spend his life with.

You took care of him to the end.  Good on you OP.  Hopefully in time you can give another pup a great life.