A new alternative to traditional laboratory testing helps assess cancer treatments for humans, while providing options to dying pets. Dogs have become more favorable to researchers because they experience cancer in similar ways to humans. Like their two-legged counterparts, canines develop secondary cancers and become resistant to drugs over time.

Unlike studies of the past, scientists don’t induce illness in the subjects. The experimental treatments are made available to pets already diagnosed with cancer.

Participating dogs continue to live at home while their family collaborates on the research, keeping detailed records on quality of life and behavior. Maintaining a normal living arrangement contributes to a more realistic reaction to the illness and treatment as compared to the more traditional laboratory rat living in a controlled environment.

Some of the experimental treatments have undergone human testing and require animal testing for regulatory reasons, but most have not been tested in humans at all.

Currently 19 veterinary institutions in the U.S. have trials underway, while Europe is still evaluating whether they want to test drugs using this new method.

After writing about the history of animal testing in June, it’s heartbreaking to learn what we’ve subjected animals to in the name of medicine. While there are ethical implications with any kind of testing, I’m glad that scientists are exploring ways of developing treatments that consider the welfare of those who have advanced the medical breakthroughs that we rely on. 

Many emergency veterinarians enjoy the challenge of gunshot wound cases, especially when we have a good outcome. It’s not very often, however, that a dog comes into our ER in critical condition from a gunshot wound, and survives, and the dog’s owner ends up dead from the very same thing. That is exactly what happened on the afternoon of November 2, 2003.

Mojo was a three-year old Miniature Pinscher, but did not deserve the “land shark” label many MinPins end up with, as he normally was affectionate and friendly. He did like to bark, however, and that tendency would lead to the demise of his owner.

Just before Mojo arrived at our emergency room, his owners, Diane and Richard, found him collapsed in their yard, struggling to breathe. His gums were pale, and he had a wound on the left side of his chest. Oxygen helped him breathe; a quick X-ray showed two bullets in his chest. One bullet was lodged right next to his spine.

As soon as Richard, Mojo’s owner, realized what had happened, he left the emergency clinic and said he was going home. He appeared calm at the time, but his wife noted a look of determination in his eyes she had not seen before. After Richard left, our team of emergency vets and techs continued to work on Mojo, administering IV fluids, pain meds and more oxygen.

When Richard arrived back at his home in the rural town of Ault, Colo., he grabbed a stick of lumber and immediately went next door to confront his neighbor. He knew immediately where the bullet had come from, because his neighbor sometimes complained about Mojo’s barking. The neighbor also ran a jewelry business out of his home, and bragged about the collection of guns he kept for security.

Richard’s neighbor was waiting for him, apparently sitting in a chair in his living room with a shotgun across his lap. When Richard knocked on the door, he shouted at the neighbor to come outside. Threats were yelled back and forth. When the neighbor refused to come outside, Richard broke the small view window in the top of the door. A shotgun blast tore through the open window and hit Richard in the middle of his chest. The wounds proved to be fatal. The shooter was released from county jail nine days later under the Colorado “Make My Day” law, where deadly force can be used to protect one’s self, family and property if they are threatened. The issue of why he could shoot Mojo without penalty was never addressed.

Meanwhile, efforts to save Mojo continued, and proved successful. He was taken off oxygen, moved out of intensive care and started on oral pain meds and antibiotics. Our success in reviving him provided some solace to Diane, Richard’s widow.

Several months later, Diane moved with Mojo to another state to try and put their nightmare behind them. As far as I know, they are getting along OK.

Further investigation revealed that the second bullet in Mojo’s chest was from a previous gunshot, and multiple pellets were also found in the side of the house where Mojo used to roam the yard and bark. He had been used as target practice by the neighbor, whose intolerance of Mojo’s barking proved to test the limits of the law and human civility.

Last week my nephew called. He was dog-sitting our cousin's dog, Chester, and he was concerned about Chester’s stiff back legs. I suggested half an aspirin, and then I said, “Not Advil. That’s not good for dogs.” I said it. I felt it was true, but like a lot of do’s and dont’s, I couldn’t bet my life on it.

Lucky for my nephew, Chester and yours truly, I remembered correctly, as this recent, sobering reminder from Patrick Miles, DVM, reveals. Not only is ibuprofen toxic for dogs—and more so for cats—the consequences can be severe. But don’t trust me, read Dr. Miles post. And, keep those bottles of Advil, Motrin, Midol, etc., safely out of your dog’s way.

A discovery by a cardiac surgeon at Colorado State University refutes the accepted wisdom that mitral valve disease, the top heart disease in dogs, is an inevitable result of aging in pets. Dr. Chris Orton and his research team believe serotonin is driving the disease in dogs and humans.

“Serotonin is made in the brain and in cells in the gut. We previously thought that those were the only places it was made before it is circulated in the blood,” Orton explains, in a statement released by CSU. “But we found the local creation of serotonin in diseased heart valves. We think that drug-induced and naturally occurring heart valve disease share the same mechanism for creating the disease—the production of serotonin. The valve is making serotonin, which causes its own disease.”

The solution? Find a drug that inhibits the production of serotonin in the heart—which is exactly what Orton and his colleagues aim to do next. Why does this matter? Mitral valve disease, also often called mitral valve prolapse in humans, tends to impact smaller breed dogs and usually develops when they are middle aged or older. Chihuahuas, King Charles Spaniels, and other toy and small breeds tend to develop the disease more often than other breeds. According to CSU, of the dogs that develop heart disease, 40 percent develop mitral valve disease, and the disease is the eventual cause of about 70 percent of all heart failure in dogs.

Orton heads up Project CARE at Colorado State. The project focuses on researching the causes of and development of new treatments for mitral valve disease in dogs. The project is supported through grass roots funding. To learn more about the program or to support the research, visit Project CARE.