Buying time for a young patient; RECORD PETS.

Byline: By NEIL McINTOSH

FERGIE is in remission now, but that doesn't mean his cancer is cured. It's a shame that his current well-being is just a temporary stop-off along the way to the inevitable.

It all started a while back. Fergie, anamiable adolescent Pointer, appeared one afternoon with a sore tummy and a lady owner who was sure he had swallowed a sock.

Abdominal palpation on the consulting room table revealed a painful mass that could well have been the intestinal foreign body she was worried about.

Subsequent X-rays and exploratory surgery put this diagnosis into doubt.

Fergie had enlarged abdominal lymph nodes and a biopsy taken during surgery soon confirmed that he had lymphosarcoma.

This is the third most common cancer found in dogs and it affects white blood cells called lymphocytes and lymphoid tissue, which is found in many parts of the body including lymph nodes, spleen, intestinal tract, liver and bone marrow.

While it is diagnosed more frequently in dogs of ages six-nine years and in Boxers, German Shepherds, Golden Retrievers, Scotties, Westies and Pointers, it can be found in any age or breed.

Lymphosarcoma can produce a variety of clinical signs, depending on which areas of the body are affected. Most commonly, the external lymph nodes are enlarged, causing golf ball-size swellings under the chin, in front of the shoulder, at the flanks and behind the knee.

Dogs may not be particularly unwell at first, but loss of appetite, thirst, weight loss and weakness soon occur. Others may be affected by gastrointestinal lymphosarcoma, vomiting, diarrhoea, weight loss, while the skin produces generalised swellings, which become red, itchy and sore.

Lymphosarcoma of the bone marrow is most often diagnosed due to anaemia, with affected dogs being tired and then there are those, like Fergie, who present with masses in their chest or abdomen.

After his initial diagnosis, Fergie was referred to a specialist oncologist at Glasgow University Vet School and, after a process called staging, when he was checked out for spread of the cancer, his chemotherapy began.

A combination of drugs was injected at weekly intervals, to avoid resistance in the cancer cells, and regular blood and urine tests monitored him for side-effects, which happily didn't occur.

Now, six months later, things are looking good. We have bought Fergie some quality time to allow him to enjoy his youth, even if he will never will grow up to be an adult, and his owner is very relieved her insurance company stumped up the pounds 4000 to pay for it all.