Prayers please - for Raven - surgery complete - doing well

Raven, our Dogue de Bordeaux woke up on Monday, October 18th with her entire neck swollen to where she had no wrinkles and was tight as tight could be. Immediately, I thought it was an insect bite or sting, aspirated with nothing, and started on dyphihydramine. I sent her to work with me husband to monitor since he is within minutes of lots of vet clinics.

A little bit of the swelling went down, but when it started going down, we noticed a HUGE knot under her jawbone on the right side with alot of edema. I made a vet appointment for her for Tuesday, and we took her in. The vet also tried to tap the knot with nothing. She wanted to try a 5 day round of steroids and antibiotics to see if it was just a deep abcess.

We came home that night, started the meds, and by the next morning Raven was bouncing around and all the edema was gone, leaving just the lump. By day two, the lump was starting to go down, slowly, but was definately getting smaller. Day three, the lump did not seem to be going down much, Day four, no change good or bad, and Day five (yesterday) it looked like it was swelling again.

Today, she is almost completely swollen up again and in pain. I have given her pain meds and we will be taking her back in, more than likely for surgery, in the morning. I am very worried that this is a thyroid tumor and from what I have read - it is not good!

Please send our baby lots of prayers as we really do not want to loose her. She is just barely a year old and is my husband's baby .... he lost his rott last summer and our previous Dogue de Bordeaux was also my husbands baby and died in his arms 3 years ago.

Thank you in advance for the prayers.

 

Re: Prayers please - for Raven

Is what scares me is if it is a thyroid tumor, prognosis is very grim for her :-( it is a fixed tumor and is the size of a softball, if not bigger) with edema coming back now also.

 

Re: Prayers please - for Raven

well from when we got up this morning till 8pm tonight - the mass swelled back up to almost how it was when we first noticed it a week ago.... so about triple between 7 am and 8 pm tonight. I went ahead and started her back on steroids to releive some of the pressure till we get into the vet tomorrow....

Here is a pic - not a very good one - but I didn't want to turn the lights on and wake her up -

My poor baby girl

 

Re: Prayers please - for Raven - pic added

I am not sure exactly what it is yet. I am dropping off blood work in the morning hoping to get a stat T4 and Free T4 (thyroid checks) along with a full CBC/Chem panel. Then hopefully I can take her in in the afternoon, get the results and see what the next step is.

I have a suspicion it is a hyperthyroid gland tumor ..... :-(

 

Re: Prayers please - for Raven - pic added

Well, we have a 9 am appointment - so I am leaving in 30 minutes to take her up to the vet. Her dr. is gone - so hopefully this one is just as willing to work with me and understand that this dogue does NOT leave my sight

 

Re: Prayers please - for Raven - pic added

Raven has a surgical appointment scheduled for 1pm tomorrow. We are going to do a biopsy, but the dr. also believes that it is cancer...... I am so upset ......