The owner of this cat was so pleased with the functional outcome she made the decision to pursue chemotherapy. Abdominal ultrasound and lymph nodes were clean. The oncologist gives a 2-3 year prognosis barring complications. Below is a link to a video demonstrating this patient eating several days postoperatively. Note the normal tongue function despite the excision of sublingual musculature.
What did the pathologist say?
Lymphoma.
Please could you tell me what happened to this cat. My cat needs to have this operation and I have to decide whether to allow her to go through this or not. other than the cancer on her chin she is healthy and happy. It has not spread t0 other areas of her body.
I am sorry to hear about your kitty. This kitty did very well for six months. The cancer spread and he was euthanized. This was very late in the process as you can tell. If we had been able to see this cat early we could have likely gotten it before spreading and he would still be happy and healthy. I would suggest you talk to the veterinary dentist that is doing the procedure and weigh all of the options, however if all points to the mass being the only issue I would strongly consider the surgery.
Dr. B
My cat had a mandibulectomy very recently. The entire right bottom of his bone was removed, but NOT because of cancer. He’s FIV positive and had a bone infection that he just couldn’t beat. I’m deathly worried about him, because he’s completely not interested in food. Yesterday (the day he came home from the hospital) he was at least sniffing and licking his food. Today, nothing. He’s lethargic, and I’m afraid he did not take this surgery well at all. I’ve been trying to syringe feed him with not much luck.
With no cancer, what sort of life expectancy am I looking at? Especially considering he’s lost all interest in food.
Hello Miranda,
I have been on vacation and sorry not to be able to respond to your post. How is your kitty at this point? The main reason for lack of apetite is inadequate pain control, especially preoperatively and intraoperatively. Continuous rate infusion of ketamine and an opiate plus a nerve block intraoperatively with placement of a pain patch and postoperative CRI are really important. Hope he is doing better.
Sincerely,
Brett