Harvey was scheduled to have another round of intravenous chemotherapy treatment on Wednesday. A reaction to medication prompted his doctor to switch to an oral dose to fight the boxer’s lymphoma.
“Animals do get cancer, just like people, and a lot of people don’t realize it,” said veterinarian Duane Henrikson, who is treating Harvey at the Emporia Veterinary Hospital. “They’re really surprised.”
Harvey’s family, Sandy Wickham and her husband Kim, had been stunned by the boxer’s diagnosis, which came shortly before Christmas.
“We found out on a Tuesday and we started treatment the next day,” Sandy Wickham said. “It was a very easy decision now that we have it here in town.”
Harvey is as precious to the Wickhams as he was worthless to his previous owners. He is the Wickhams’ third “throw-away dog,” Sandy Wickham explained, as she talked about Harvey during an interview early in the week.
Like many other “throw-away dogs,” Harvey came from a dog pound. His luck in being found by the Wickhams has given him over five years of luxury and the opportunity to enjoy more time with them, if treatment is successful.
Henrikson has been using chemotherapy for the past several years to treat patients diagnosed with cancer.
“K-State had a couple of oncologists on board five or six years ago,” Henrikson said, mentioning the veterinary teaching hospital at Kansas State University in Manhattan. “I got interested in working with them, attended seminars about chemotherapy and diagnosis.”
Chemotherapy, however, is not a panacea in the animal world any more than it is for humans, he said. Surgery continues to be the best option for some types of cancer, like breast cancer, and others may require radiation therapy, which is not done at the hospital.
Diagnosis and prognosis combine to indicate the best course for each case.
Henrikson said that some cases are diagnosed and treated in Emporia. Others may need to be sent to K-State, which is better equipped to determine whether the cancer has metastasized, what stage the cancer is in, and what chemotherapy routine would be appropriate.
“A lot of them, we will follow up with the chemotherapy here in Emporia and monitor it with blood chemistries and blood counts and response,” he said. “...There’s been quite a few animals that have gone through various treatments.”
As with humans, Henrikson said that it is important to weigh options and the prognosis before deciding on cancer treatment.
“Some cancers respond much better to chemotherapy ...,” he said. “Is the treatment worse than the disease? Can we expect one month of additional life span or a year and a half? All those kinds of things come into play.”
Harvey, at approximately 6 years old, is young enough to warrant trying to save and, if the odds are with him, chemotherapy could buy him another year and a half to two years of a comfortable life. One dog who underwent the same treatment managed to stretch his life span to four years, Wickham said.
“So, we wanted to do what we could,” she said. “It would have been different if he’d been 10 or 12 years old. ...”
Wickham said that Harvey already has lived longer than Hendrikson’s minimum estimate.
“They thought he might have been gone by now if he didn’t start the treatment,” she said.
Harvey’s first tumor was about the size of a golf ball, and it showed up rather quickly on the lean boxer’s collarbone. Many small round growths are only fatty cysts, Henrikson said, and are aspirated with a needle to draw cells to check in the laboratory.
Harvey’s initial biopsy came back negative, but the follow-up biopsy showed cancer and treatment began. The tumor disappeared quickly.
Almost as quickly, however, lumps showed up under his chin.
Harvey will continue his 26 weeks of treatment — one per week the first four weeks, one week off, one per week the second four weeks, then every-other week until the regimen is completed Wickham said.
All of the treatment plans are contingent on the results of Harvey’s blood tests and reactions, which are checked regularly to make sure he is healthy enough to accommodate the chemotherapy.
Henrikson said that animals react differently than humans receiving chemo, they often are not sick afterwards and, because animals’ hair follicles are not completely active like human follicles, they do not suffer the hair loss usually associated with the treatment.
“We are injecting toxic chemicals,” Henrikson said. “That’s why they work.”
They also can cause reactions that complicate treatment.
Until this week, Harvey has tolerated chemo well. He had not been sick and had even regained most of the weight he’d lost.
The treatment two weeks ago turned harsh and he sometimes vomited. Despite that, he continued to want his daily walks, play with his toys, and enjoy the company of his “sister,” another boxer the Wickhams rescued.
Harvey has many reasons to live, and the family said they are hoping he will. For now, though, it is a matter of waiting.
“We just kind of go week to week,” Wickham said.