Hello everyone,

I have a neutered male big long haired German Shepherd dog named Draco (got him from a GS breeder when he was 8 weeks old, looks mixed because he's blonde colored. People ask if he is a Golden Retriever or Collie mix, but doesn't matter to me.) He is currently around 125 pounds and is 7 years and 11 months old, his birthday is coming up soon August 2nd! He has lost about 5 pounds in the past month and a half due to a strict diet change for him to lose some weight. Vets have said he should ideally be in the 110 pounds range. He's eating and drinking fine, no vomiting or diarrhea, goes to the bathroom fine, still has the same personality. The only thing different is his limping pain. Draco is also my ESA.

He was officially diagnosed with osteosarcoma from a biopsy a few days, on his front right leg near the shoulder.

Here's the long story of when this journey started:

He started limping the last week of May this year, took him to the vet beginning of June for the limping. The vet said it could be an elbow issue because his movements were resisting in that area when the vet was checking his joints. We went home with a couple of different medications, Tramadol and Carprofen (Rimadyl/Rovera). I was giving Draco buffered aspirin until we were able to get an appointment in with the vet, but thought it was strange the buffered aspirin wasn't working like it had quickly in the past. After a couple of weeks with the vet's prescribed medication (stopped buffered aspirin), Draco's limping didn't get any better. So I took him to the vet and they did xrays on his leg and chest, they saw a small lesion in the xrays but wanted to send them over to a radiologist for a second opinion. Update came back on the xrays confirming they didn't see anything in the chest area but something seen with the leg xrays. Waited a week for the results of the xrays. The vet then recommended a biopsy and we had that done, about a week and a half later, final results were bone bone cancer/osteosarcoma, on Tuesday July 11th. All during this time Draco was still limping and in pain, his medications were increased and a 3rd medication was prescribed, Gabapentin, and eventually that one was increased as well. The vet recommended to make an appointment with an Oncologist, got that taken care of the next day.

Draco and I went to see the Oncologist and she explained the treatment options and expectations of each, things I already read about. I told her that I'm willing to do whatever treatment is needed, whether it is amputation and/or combination of therapies.

Since Draco was a big dog, she wanted to have an orthopedic vet examine him to see if Draco is a good candidate for amputation. We set up the date for this coming Monday July 17th the earliest they could fit him in. And was given the good to go for amputation that day if the orthopedic vet said Draco was a good candidate for it. At the end of our consultation with the Oncologist, I pointed out that I had mentioned a small half pea sized lump in Draco's skin just behind his right armpit area. I noticed he had that lump several months ago and had brought it up to vets when we visited, but they didn't see it as a concern at the time, or they forgot about it when focused on other main reasons why we were there for the visit. Anyways, this was several months ago before Draco started limping. The Oncologist thought it was just compacted blood and said she'd aspirate it and check it out under the microscope. She came back and said it doesn't look good and thinks it could be spindle cells, that it could be metastasis from the bone cancer. And if that were the case, she would not recommend amputation at that point and would recommend doing radiation therapy instead. She said the reason she would not recommend amputation is because if it is metastasis, then Draco wouldn't have long to live anyways and the quality of life wouldn't be as great, compared to radiation therapy, due to the 2-3 weeks recovery of amputation and the prognosis after that being so short. She sent that sample to a pathologist for a 2nd opinion and will get results to me within a couple of days.

I know that amputation will get rid of the pain and where the main cancer is at, and I understand that there could already be microscopic spread into the lungs or other parts of the body that xrays won't show. But I feel like keeping that leg is ruling out one of my options of keeping my dog alive. The oncologist said prognosis for radiation therapy without amputation is usually a few to 6 months while amputation could be up to a year or more with chemo. What's going on in my mind right now is that if he doesn't go under amputation and goes with palliative treatments in radiation therapy, his pain might be reduced but the limping could still be there and given the short prognosis of this course of treatment. This doesn't sound like a great quality of life to me. I've read many stories from owners with their decision on treatments and I liked reading stories of how their dogs lived way past the short prognosis that was given to them. I guess I'm wondering if it's possible for me to go against recommendation of not having amputation, to have them do the amputation anyways even if they did find that little half pea sized mass to be cancerous? Should I get a second opinion elsewhere? Draco is still limping, basically already carrying himself on 3 legs with the 3 high dosage of medications he's on: 300 mg of Tramadol 3 times a day, 800 mg of Gabapentin twice a day, and 100 mg of Carprofen twice a day. 

Being just new to this site/community, I'm doing my best in getting more informed and reading through the forums.

Thank you for reading my long post, I'm really having a hard time with all of this. Any suggestions and encouragements etc. are greatly appreciated! 

-RJ