Amputation alternatives for dogs with bone cancer are few and far between. Thankfully, a procedure known as cementoplasty is giving more dogs a chance at a great quality of life without losing a leg to this terrible disease. Kevin is one such dog, and here is his story.
Two Best Friends Creating a New Life Together
After living and working overseas for a few years, Vincent Sarlo returned to the US in search of a new home, and a new best canine friend. He found Kevin at a local rescue, and the two became inseparable. They bar-hopped together, strolled downtown on the weekends, charmed the locals, and few people ever saw them apart. “He’s honestly my best friend,” Vincent explains.
Kevin was often mistaken for a puppy despite his age. “He has so much energy, he doesn’t act like he’s 9 years old! We take him to like the bars around where we live, and the restaurants and stuff, and everybody’s always saying ‘He must be a puppy!’” Vincent shared with us.
The limp that changed everything
The first sign something was wrong was a subtle limp. Kevin would tire out sooner than expected. Was it age slowing him down? Arthritis? Vincent didn’t know, but he knew he had to investigate. “I just got pet insurance like the year before that, just because I knew his age was getting up there, and I was like, I want to be responsible, and I want to be able to help him if anything ever happens, because he never really goes to the vet. He just gets his yearly shots, and that’s it. He’s never had any problems,” he recalls.
Like many dogs with osteosarcoma, the limp happened infrequently—at first. But when Kevin’s odd gait persisted and a lump on Kevin’s shoulder appeared one day, it was time to take action. Vincent remembers the sinking feeling when he got the bad news from Kevin’s vet. Cancer was “not even something that crossed my mind,” he recalls.
When amputation is not an option, then what do you do for your best friend?
Unlike many people, Vincent didn’t recoil at the idea of amputation. But knowing how Kevin always struggled with veterinary visits (to the point of needing heavy sedation, even for routine health checks), Vincent wanted to avoid anything that would bring on more stress.
He desperately wanted to do something that would maintain his dog’s quality of life, for whatever time he had left. Amputation just didn’t seem to be that option for his boy.
Chemotherapy didn’t sit well with him either. “Seeing it in my younger sister’s two-year old son, and my grandparents growing up, (I know) it’s not a pretty sight. And knowing how difficult he is to sedate, it was like, I don’t know if this is what I want to do to him. I don’t want to amputate his leg, and then have to deal with sedating him and wrestling him just to give him the chemotherapy every time. I just didn’t know if that was the route that I wanted to go.”
The Cementoplasty Amputation Alternative for Dogs with Bone Cancer
The idea of cementoplasty came when Vincent found our Tripawd Talk Radio podcast with BIOCERA-VET, the company that introduced the veterinary world to this well-studied amputation alternative for humans.
The idea here is to fill that bone cavity with a cement. So BIOCERA-VET is a paste, and once it is injected inside the cavity, it’s going to solidify. That going to reinforce the bond, it’s going to provide some bone structure. And that is going to have the dog feeling less pain, first of all, but as well as going to reduce the risk for pathological fracture. It’s going to improve the quality of life in general, and it’s going to reduce the limping of the dog as well. — Fanny Guillerminet, PhD, Managing Director of BIOCERA-VET US Operations
This cementoplasty treatment can be given to dogs with osteosarcoma, as a palliative treatment when amputation is not ideal. It is a minimally invasive injection directed into the affected bone that has been weakened by a tumor. BIOCERA-VET studies show that it reduces the risk of pathologic fracture, relieves pain and improves patient comfort and quality of life.
Learning about cementoplasty on Tripawd Talk Radio
After listening to our second cementoplasty podcast, “An Osteosarcoma Limb Sparing Cementoplasty Success Story!” he reached out to Dr. Shaina Stewart Soule of PetSound Animal Hospital in North Carolina. She was the first vet in the United States to perform the Cementoplasty procedure on a canine with bone cancer. Dr. Soule’s client was Hayley, mom to Colt, another dog recently diagnosed with the same type of cancer that Kevin had and the pup featured in our podcast.
“I can’t explain it. But it was like I was meant to hear that interview. I just felt like this is what I need to be pursuing.” Vincent said.
During the interview, Hayley talked about how much puppy energy her dog still had in him, and Vincent immediately felt a kinship with her. He knew what it was like to know that your energetic dog’s life was about to change, and he wanted to learn more.
Could this limb-sparing amputation alternative help Kevin?
“All I wanted to do was just give him that life back, regardless of how long it was going to be,” said Vincent. I just wanted to allow him to go outside and go on those walks again, even if they were shorter than before in some way, shape or form.”
The Tripawds community became a lifeline resource for Vincent. Meanwhile he also reached out to Dr. Soule. She answered Vincent’s most pressing questions about this relatively new limb sparing procedure in the veterinary world.
“She was amazing. She was so helpful. And you could just tell that from speaking with me through email and such that she absolutely loves that if she can help a dog with cementoplasty, she wants to. But she’s very honest, which I really respected.”
Getting the facts about choosing cementoplasty instead of amputation surgery
Cementoplasty is a relatively quick procedure with recovery time and costs comparable to amputation surgery. But isn’t right for every dog with osteosarcoma, and Kevin wasn’t the best candidate for it, mainly because of the tumor location.
“There’s a lot more to consider than this just being a leg saving surgery, because it’s not always going to be that way. There are risks involved with it,” Vincent explained. Those risks include fracture, or surgical complications that one needs to consider before moving forward.
“It’s not a prime surgery for every single candidate,” Vincent explained. “It really depends like where the tumor is and such. And it’s not going to save the dog from the cancer either. So you do have to be prepared for that.” But, he knew that if could accept the risks of potential complications, Kevin might get more quality time.
Accepting the risks and finding a clinical trial
“He jumps off the bed. He spins in circles. He’s jumping up and down, just loving to go at the front door in the morning. He’s still running to the bowl. He’s sitting with us while we make it in the kitchen, running to the bowl, spinning in circles until we put it there. So I was like his quality of life is so high! If there’s an opportunity to keep that going for him, that’s what I want to pursue. And if there are risks involved with that, then I’m okay accepting those risks of amputation to know that I tried to keep his quality of life going.”
Vincent ended up enrolling Kevin in a cementoplasty clinical trial with the University of Florida’s College of Veterinary Medicine. Located a couple of hours away from home, the protocol that UF followed for the trial included three days of stereotactic radiation therapy, followed by the cementoplasty procedure about a week or so later. Kevin spent a total of one night in the hospital afterward, then went home to rest and recover while the cement settled into his bone.
Cementoplasty is an exciting new option for dogs who aren’t amputation candidates. But if a pet parent chooses cementoplasty with radiation therapy, the process is not as simple as an injection into the affected leg and then the dog goes home.
For Kevin, cementoplasty was not a “one-and-done” procedure like amputation surgery.
“It’s not an easy process,” Vincent warns. “It’s not going to be coming in here having the radiation done, going home. Your dog’s completely fine, and then having the surgery done, and then you’re everything’s fine.
“After that you still have to monitor him, to make sure that he doesn’t do anything too excessive in between radiation and surgery,” he explained It also requires two long weeks of strict inactivity for the cement to set up inside the tumor cavity.
Thankfully, Kevin’s surgery and recovery from cementoplasty went well, and he only experienced a minimal amount of discomfort during the after-care. About a month after surgery he developed a limp, which was terrifying and like getting the cancer diagnosis all over again. But after thorough diagnostics, Kevin’s vet team considered it some type of unrelated soft tissue injury and general inflammation at the injection site. Gradually, the limp decreased but sometimes appears after lots of activity.
Kevin is Still Kevin, Active, Happy, and Living Life to the Max on Three!
Today, Vincent monitors Kevin’s daily life carefully, and with great pain management guidance from his vet, his best buddy still gets to do what he does best: chasing squirrels, running into puddles of water, jumping at the door to go on walks, and enjoying life.
“He’s as happy as he can be, and this is everything that I was hoping I could give him,” Vincent explains with the kind of relief and joy that only someone who has been through a bone cancer ordeal can truly appreciate. Today, his handsome sidekick is still going strong, nearly six months later.