Thank you so much for the replies. They have been very helpful!

I wanted to give you an update on what we know now that it has been a few weeks.:

The staging results came back clear. Kitna has no evidence of additional MCTs in his liver, spleen, lymphnodes, or lungs. I have been in contact with a veterinary oncologist at CSU (Colorado State University) and she has given me a few other options. They have a couple of clinical trials that they are doing at the moment with Kinavet, but whether or not Kitna can get into them is dependant on the grade of the tumor.

I had no idea at the time of the staging that grading a tumor is completely different from staging it. Staging tells us the spread, grading tells us how aggressive the tumor is and how likely it is to spread. If I had known that a few weeks ago, we would have done the grading first. Oh well. Now I know for next time.

I called Advanced Veterinary Care in SLC, UT (which is where we paid over $1000 to have the cancer staged) to see how much they would charge us to do the biopsy and they quoted me the exact same estimate for complete removal of the tumor with reconstructive surgery. To backtrack just a wee bit, AVC estimated $2400 for removal of the tumor and $3600 for complete amputation of Kitna's front leg. I called to get a comparison quote from our primary vet (who can do the amputation, but not the removal due to the tricky location) and he quoted me less than $1000 for amputation. So I am now under the impression that AVC is incredibly overpriced and they have an inflated sense of self-worth. Moving on. . .

I needed to find a place that could biopsy the tumor and send it to CSU, so I called around trying to get prices and I found a place called Mountain View Animal Hospital. Their veterinarian was able to send samples to CSU and she quoted me $550 to biopsy the tumor and send the "cores" to CSU. So last Wednesday we had the tumor biopsied (it wasn't able to be removed due to the location) and I have had to bring Kitna back to the vet's every other day (or there abouts; Thurs, Sat, Mon, and today) so that they can check on his wound. Well, on Monday we found out that the biopsy site is infected, so Kitna is now on antibiotics. His bandage fell off last night and I had to rebandage him at home, and now I need to take him back to the vets so that they can redo the bandage. 

(Oh, and add to this that the day after we got the tumor biopsied my other dog [a very naughty lab/staffy mix] snitched Kitna's anti-inflammatory meds off the kitchen counter and ate 450mg of Rimadyl, which I didn't discover until I got home at 8pm after 8.5 hours at work and 3.5 hours at school. So the day after Kitna got back from the vet's we had to go to the emergency vets to get Snicker's to throw up that yummy medication she so greedily stole. I no longer keep dog meds on the kitchen counter. . .I should have known better, but I didn't think she would be interested in the pill bottle because it wasn't food. Apparently it smelled like food though.)

Has anyone on here had a mast cell tumor biopsied rather than removed completely? The vet at Mountain View Animal Hospital says that mast cell tumors bleed a lot and they are prone to infection when they are biopsied. But she chose not to put Kitna on antibiotics right after surgery because she didn't think that the biopsy sites were big enough to pose an infection risk. I'm asking about infection because I am trying to determine if this occurred through no fault of her own or if perhaps there was something that we could have done to make this recovery a bit easier for Kitna. Luckily his foot isn't bothering him at all and he is walking and running on it with no issues. 🙂

Through talking with my mother, I think we have decided that we don't have enough money to get the tumor removed and be able to save his leg. So I think we are now down to three options. 1. Amputate through our primary vet and hope that his body can recover quickly and as painlessly as possible. 2. Let the biopsy site heal and leave the tumor alone, watch it, and if it gets any bigger try to shrink it with steroid injections, and then follow that up with blood-work and x rays every 6 months. 3. Let the biopsy site heal and since it is a low grade 2 tumor, put Kitna on Kinavet (which we can get for free through our primary vet due to a very generous donation from another family whose dog passed away from cancer), and hope that that contains it and stops it from spreading.

I think the hardest part about this is I want to make the best decision for Kitna, the one that will give him the longest life, and I don't know what that option is because I don't have any way to know exactly how old he is. I'm a bit suspicious that he may actually be closer to 11, because I have never seen a dog without arthritis, who is as active, playful and happy as Kitna is at age "13".

Thanks again for all of your advice and help. And a special thank you to Christine from Canada. Your story about your 14 year old spaniel gives me a bit of hope that even older dog bodies can handle amputation. 🙂

(Sorry that this post was so long!)

Hi Jerry.

So I think I ought to clarify a bit. The staff at AVC have been wonderful, and I am sure that they are quite skilled, I just wish I could afford to get the mass removed through them. Removing the mass would probably be the best option for us, but we can't afford it. So all of my disgruntlement with them comes from their high-prices, not from the staff or the skills of the veterinarians that work there. I do also wonder if perhaps they aren't tacking on some extra stuff that would be nice to do, but isn't strictly necessary, like 3 sets of x-rays. Why would x-rays need to be done (for $130 a pop) when we are removing a mass from his leg and not fiddling with any of his bones (aside from the leg) or internal organs? The estimate they gave me had probably about 15 line items on it, and the one that I got from Mountain View had 5. I realize that if I were to get the mass removed with AVC that it would be a more extensive process than a biopsy and so that could be the reason that they had 15 line items on the estimate. But it appears that they were charging for each anesthesia drug individually whereas Mountain View charged for them in a lump. It is interesting to me to see how different veterinary practices will price things. 🙂

With regards to my primary vet, here is a copy of an e-mail that he sent me:

"The hardest part with this to me is Kitna's age. There is a saying in this business that, "Age is not a disease."  However, I personally would not amputate my own dog's leg at this age in a large breed dog. Recovery would be much easier in a younger dog, but front legs are much harder than back legs regardless of the age. Yes, everything else looks good in the testing, but it is never a guarantee; they are only able to sample a couple of very small areas compared to the overall sizes of the liver and spleen.

I completely agree with Jerry. Cindy, that was very helpful! I was able to locate your blog and I found the pictures of Maggie. 😀 She looks very happy! I'm glad that she is recovering so well. And I completely understand about being a worrier, Cindy. I am one as well, although it's not so bad now that I am on anti-anxiety drugs. 🙂

I'm planning on speaking to my husband about what he thinks we should do next this weekend. (Since he works nights and I work days we don't see each other much during the week). Hopefully we can come to a final decision and stick with it lol. I had thought that I had made a final decision a few weeks ago, but then I looked into clinical trials and things kind of spiraled out of control haha.