Q.I have a 13-year-old terrier, poodle and cocker spaniel mix. A year ago he showed signs of cancer with an enlarged node and lesion on his lip. The biopsy report showed squamous cell carcinoma. We opted for the less radical surgery for the removal of the node and lesion. No evidence of cancer was left. Since we neither removed part of the jaw nor followed up with chemotherapy, we expected the cancer to return and it has. There is a lemon-sized growth at his neck.

 

A.This is a very aggressive form of cancer. I recommend one kind of surgery – cryo-surgery. This surgery non-invasively freezes the tumor and leaves it there. The body then rejects it. Cryo-surgery converts live tissue to dead tissue so it has an immunostimulatory effect. Unfortunately, the best that any surgery can do is bring the body back to the place it was before the tumor grew. It does nothing to prevent another tumor from growing. Consider this car analogy: If black smoke is coming out of the tailpipe, you can remove the tailpipe but it does nothing to help the car.

Your dog will need a lot of immune enhancements following the surgery. Unfortunately, however, you don’t have enough time to work with just the immune system at this point, but I really recommend metabollically balancing the body to help strengthen the immune system after the surgery.