Dog, as well as being man's best
friend, is the only other creature on Earth known to die from cancer of
the prostate.

Which is why Bernie is in intensive care. His giant head resting on his
paws, the massive Bernese mountain dog is recovering from the removal of
a blockage that was making it difficult to relieve himself.

The doctors feared that it was prostate cancer. The biopsy will prove
them right.

Around the corner in the oncology ward, a mixed terrier named Dakota is
getting over a blast of radiation to treat a nasal tumour and a sarcoma
on the hip.

Down the hall, Milou, a snow-white Great Pyrenees, roams around, albeit
gingerly because of a large tumour on her right, front paw, waiting to
have the CT scan that will determine how far her bone cancer has spread.

Elsewhere, a cat with a suspected brain tumour is having an MRI. A
golden cocker spaniel, which arrived two weeks ago from Korea, is being
prepped in the oncology ward for treatment for cancer in its ear canal.
And radiation therapist Kim Stewart has just finished treating a
150-pound, pot-bellied pig.

At first blush, it looks like an episode of Celebrity Pets
featuring overly sentimental people willing and able to drop serious
money on high-tech medical care for Spot and Rover.

Doctors and health-care professionals who research and treat cancer in
pets are familiar with criticism from those who can't fathom why
resources are directed at animals, when there's so much more to do in
the fight against cancer in humans.

But the oncologists and their support team at Guelph are well past the
sneers and jeers, primarily because they have been able to prove the
bond between pet and owner has an added dimension: Patients of the
Animal Cancer Centre at the University of Guelph's world-renowned
Veterinary College also are taking part in scientific research.

“
I know some people don't understand giving money to a research program
for animals… But in my mind, it's all one biology as far as cancer is
concerned. ”—
Elizabeth Stone, dean of the Ontario Veterinary College

They are helping to develop new treatments for animals that, in turn,
are expected to result in breakthroughs in human care – a contribution
so vital that it is in large part responsible for the $20-million
expansion of the centre that should be finished next year.

For years, cancer research was the work of rodents. Mice and rats
received injections to induce tumours that were then used to evaluate
potential therapies. But there was a big problem: Rarely did something
successful with a lab rat work well when tried on a human.

Frustrated, comparative oncologists – the collective medical (human)
oncologists, veterinary oncologists, academics and pharmaceutical
companies who have been studying cancer in different species for 30
years – began to pay more attention to pets, especially dogs.

“If it wasn't such a struggle, if cancer research was efficiently done,
and wasn't so expensive, there might not be this need,” says Tony
Mutsaers, a veterinary oncologist at the centre who is also finishing
his PhD in medical biophysics at the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre
in Toronto, an hour's drive to the east.

“But the dog is now viewed by many as a plausible stepping stone.”