We came down from Vail yesterday so we could get Karma up to CSU for her 6 month check up of her vaccine trial. With Covid restrictions in place, it made it super weird. Danielle, the clinical trial coordinator came out to the car to get Karma and then walked her through the barricade and to the oncology clinic. And off she went, happily wagging her tail.
Jenny had to sit in the car and wait for a phone call. Luckily, there was some work to be done, so it wasn’t terrible. Then we got the call that they needed to remove a mass off Karma as it was suspect for a Mast Cell Tumor (MCT.) When they described where the mass was, Jenny knew exactly the bump they were talking about…and it had been there for about a decade! In fact, when Karma was enrolled in the trial, Jenny pointed it out and mentioned that we hadn’t taken it off because it is on Karma’s anus, and that area doesn’t always heal well, so our vet suggested we just leave it and monitor it. It hasn’t grown in 10 years. Before enrolling in the trial, they check every lump and bump, but must not have checked this one since it had been there and monitored for so long? If it had come back as an MCT then, it would have disqualified Karma from the clinical trial.
But here we were today. A suspect lump. The oncologist that called said he wanted to have a surgeon remove the mass to get full histology and he also wanted to get a FNA of her liver and spleen since that is where MCTs tend to metastasize. Jenny wasn’t overly concerned…how aggressive could the MCT be if it hadn’t grown in a decade? So permission was given and Karma had the procedures done. She was most annoyed that she didn’t get the copius amount of treats she is accustomed to getting from her clinical trial friends.
The procedures went smoothly and after Karma had recovered a bit they brought her back out to the car. On the way home, we got the call that her liver and spleen were totally normal, with no metastasis. Later came the call that it was a MCT. As suspected, low grade, 1 with a complete excision which is considered curative. So, Karma is out of the clinical trial, but she did get the three vaccine series and as of today is completely cancer free. Hopefully, she was in the active arm of the trial and got some benefit from the vaccines. And the clear bill of health today gives us some peace of mind; we hope she will be with us for a long time to come.
