Hi All, I have posted about this product a couple of times in the past.  But I thought I would do it again as the company continues to expand and successfully treat cancer in a variety of pets (dogs, cats, horses).  

Here is a great website of a dog recently treated that had a baseball sized tumor on its paw.  It was treated with a single treatment (done with moderate sedation because treatment involves multiple injections that must be done with precision).  As shown, three months later the same area was largely healed and the dog was walking normally. 

https://www.rad.....rapy-pets/

It can be used for any sarcoma near the surface, even small ones that can be surgically removed, but it is usually used to treat cancer's that were not successfully removed via surgery or are located in an area that prevents the use of surgery.  Many of the treatments are done with the specific goal of preventing amputation.  They recently started testing treatment for mast tumors, but I don't know if they are routinely treating that tumor type.

How it works:

The product is infused with Yi-90.  It is the radiation that kills the tumor.  So it is using a well understood technique to kill cancer.  It how it gets the radiation to the tumor that is 'new'.  When temperatures are moderate, the product is a liquid and can be put into a syringe.  When the material is injected into a tumor the warmth of the body causes the liquid to turn to a solid which fixes the material in lace inside the tumor (versus leaking into surrounding tissue).  The radioactivity decays quickly being gone in a couple of weeks.  It is also a type of radioactive particle that loses its affect quickly with distance and is easily shielded (with plastic wrap rather than lead blanket). So little risk to others. But most importantly since the radiation doesn't travel far from the material, nearby tissue and organs are not negatively affected by the radiation.

The material is naturally absorbed into the body so no further treatment is needed after the treatment.  So a tumor is treated with a single visit to the vet, getting a treatment that only involves multiple injections and then going home and managing the wound as the tumor dies and decays.  Pets are up and running around in just days. The example above was a very large tumor so it required management of the dead and dying tissue.  Smaller tumors (1 inch and less diameter) do not have the wound management issues.  

The same company is getting close to getting limited approval of the product for use in humans to treat tumors in the thyroid (that is the application area that doctors at the Mayo clinic doctors to use it..the Mayo clinic doctors are going to run the clinical trials to get approval for use in humans).  

The company now offers the procedure in not only Wa, but also Mo, and Md.  The Md location is John Hopkins university vet clinic.  So with Mayo human physicians and John Hopkins vets behind it you can be assured it is a viable treatment.  They plan to expand to more sites in the coming year.

Details on those and how to submit a request to be considered for treatment is here:

https://www.rad.....l-clinics/

It seems like an amazing product that not enough pet parents are aware of.  It costs about the same as it would of you got you pet treated with external radiation (given via those large machines).  I think it is about $10k (yes expensive! 🙁 ).  The more patients they get the lower the price will be because the cost is mostly to create the material.  If they can treat 5 animals at a time that cost is split 5 ways.