mast cell tumors and nose problem
Hi!
11 year old golden retriever female. Spayed. Adopted earlier this year as a senior dog, as her favorite human passed away and she was left behind with no one to claim her.
She had a clean bill of health when we adopted her besides just being overweight and having mild joint issues. (We were able to actually turn that around with diet and exercise). She also had seasonal allergies reported.
Flash forward to last month when we noticed she had a swollen face. We thought it was an allergic reaction so we brought her to the vet ER and they told us they think it may be something else and that we needed to do further testing.
Responded to Prednisone and it went down for about a week and then blew up again.
Brought her back to her regular vet who did a needle aspiration and determined she had mast cell tumors. Referred to oncologist.
Oncologist did scans and confirmed MST in her cheek and it had spread to her liver. Gave us estimate for chemo, but we weren't sure we wanted to do that to her at her age, so we asked about Palladia. We were taking some time to decide (affordability is an issue, Palladia and/or chemo are too expensive for us right now) when we unexpectedly lost our other dog.
We felt we had the swelling/tumor under control while we grieved and also were trying to move $ around to be able to afford the treatment.
This weekend she scratched her nose and it was bleeding a bit, and then it scabbed over with a blobby white scab.
The scab got bigger and then when we arrived home from work today, it had fallen out leaving a huge hole or crater in her nose.
She isn't bleeding, but it does look really raw.
She keeps licking it but we aren't sure how to get her to stop doing that.
We are planning to bring her into the vet tomorrow. What will they be able to do? Do you think this might be the end? Is this painful? She seems like her normal self... I'm so afraid of this space getting infected. I also want to know if I should take off work to be with my husband when he brings her in case we have to say goodbye.