Caring for a Three Legged Dog or Cat
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Sparky will get his staples out and will start his first CCNU treatment tomorrow. I know this is a pill given by the vet but other than that, I have no idea what to expect from this or what to watch out for. If anyone has some words of wisdom for me, I would love to hear them.
Also, has anyone been following the clinical trial results regarding Liposomal Clodronate? There seems to be some promising discoveries being made in this area. I think the scientists are trying it in combo with, and prior to, CCNU.
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Oh good luck Sparky!
I don't have any experience with taking CCNU (Lomustine is the brand name), but others here do. If you do a search you'll find lots of talk here.
I found this white paper on what to expect after treatment, hope this helps.
There are a ton of clinical trials for Liposomal Clodronate, like this one at Colorado State. Is there any chance you can get into one?
Tripawds Founders Jim and Rene
tripawds.com | tripawds.org | bemoredog.net | triday.pet
Tate was on CCNU, sailed through the first two treatments with no problems except he was really tired one day after the first. He just slept a lot that day. Then he had a reaction after the third, details are here if you are interested: http://tate.tri.....-months/ The worst of it was a fever one day of 105. Luckily, we were able to get him into the local vet within 20 minutes and they gave him some kind of cold pack to bring it down. So get yourself a digital thermometer if you don't have one just to be on the safe side. They reduced the dose on the fourth treatment, only a minor reaction, and then we stopped.
We gave Tate the pills ourselves then had his bloodwork done about a week later. His white blood cell count dropped and also his neutrophil seg but everything is now back to normal.
Sorry, haven't heard about Liposomal Chodronate.
http://tate.tripawds.com/
August 16, 2006 to November 28, 2011
TATE ~ Forever in our hearts.
Maggie the tri-Pug had 7 treatments of CCNU- it was one of two chemo drugs used for her treatments, she had mast cell cancer. You can read about her treatments in her blog on the Amputation and Chemo page.
Her chemo protocol took about 6 months to complete. She got a treatment every other week, and the two drugs were alternated so she got CCNU every 4 weeks. She had some tiredness, and one treatment had to be postponed because of a low WBC, but I'm not sure if that was after the CCNU or the the other drug, vinblastine. She had more symptoms of tiredness and a little nausea after the vinblastine treatments.
Mag's oncologist took a conservative approach to starting the chemo. She started with a low dose of each drug, then slowly increased the dose until symptoms appeared. Then she backed off to the dose that did not cause symptoms (symptoms were primarily neaseau).
I would definitely get a thermometer and practice a couple of times- I had to constantly monitor Maggie's temp to look for signs of illness or infection.
I would also suggest you keep a log book. I recorded chemo dates and type and then each day recorded Maggie's energy level, what she ate or drank, what meds were administered, pee and poop status, temperature, and overall mood. Really useful for me to track her status and progress. It showed me patterns and when I could expect to see some down time.
Good luck with the chemo treatments.
Karen and the pugapalooza
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