Snakes and cancer

[TrpnBils]

Just wondering if anyone has any thoughts or references for this topic. One of our boas at work had a lump biopsied about 6 weeks ago and it came back positive for both myosarcoma and osteosarcoma. We're not really sure what to do about it yet, but I feel like the vet is dragging her feet on it so I'm looking at outside sources now. Even just ideas...anything. He's almost 20 years old, so he's had a full life, but other than this he's in great health, an awesome snake, and a great educational animal and could live several more years if this is possible to fix.

Another note, the tumor was near his spine, so not much more can be removed without possibly injuring his spinal cord, and he has never refused a meal in the past 3 years...except he hasn't eaten since the surgery.

[Rich in KY]

What are the options? I can't imagine that chemo is available for snakes. And as you said, the tumor is near the spine and no further surgery is an option. So it seems, the options are to either euthanize him or let him die naturally from the cancer. From what I can find on osteosarcoma, it is a malignant form of bone cancer. This probably means he doesn't have long. If he is not in pain, I would probably let him die peacefully rather than euthanize. If pain is involved, it may be better to euthanize.

[Cat_Eyed_Lady]

From what I know, when a cancer is opened up and not all can be removed... it will spred even faster because of the contact with air :( I am so sorry... I hope that by some chance he is able to be saved and that he can live without pain til his last days.

[TrpnBils]

That's pretty much where I'm at with it too. It's just something I've never read about in snakes before, so I wondered if anyone else knew much about it.

[Nanci]

Sorry to hear that. I bet most snakes don't live long enough to get cancer. Probably a big university hospital is your only hope for information.

http://www.ufvmc.com/SmallAnimal.aspx

UFVMC
2015 SW 16th Ave.
Gainesville, FL 32610
Phone:
Large Animal Hospital: 352-392-2229
Small Animal Hospital: 352-392-2235
FAX : 352-392-4877

[TrpnBils]

I bet most snakes don't live long enough to get cancer.

That was my assumption too. He did eat last night finally so maybe there's a chance...

[Rich in KY]

My heart goes out to the poor guy!

[TrpnBils]

Update!

This kinda got thrown at us late yesterday, but he's been treated again and is back in his home now. We took him for a treatment of Photodynamic Therapy over at a vet clinic an hour or so away. It was really fascinating to watch the procedure, which basically just involved treating the tumor directly with drugs (20 mins), and hitting it with a specific wavelength of red light (not a laser, just regular light. This took 40 minutes). The drug can either be given orally (mammals), through IV, or applied directly like in this case, and it only accumulates in cancerous cells apparently.

Once it's hit with this wavelength, it activates the drug and kills the cancer cells directly rather than through apoptosis. For lack of a better description, the tumor swells up like a bad sunburn, turns into a big black scab after a few days, and then falls off.

Apparently there's a 70%+ success rate in cats and dogs at this particular clinic, and although they've never treated a reptile this way, there are several studies out there that have shown great success with this type of tumor in snakes.

Hopefully I'll be able to get some pictures to post up here soon.

[Nanci]

That's great that they're attempting a treatment, even though they haven't done a reptile before. 70% is great odds! I had a friend who had lung cancer with a 5% chance of survival, and she made it!

Nanci

[Rich in KY]

That is amazing! I hope things work out for the lil guy.

[TrpnBils]

That is amazing! I hope things work out for the lil guy.

Did I mention he's 9 feet and just over 40 pounds? :cool:

[Rich in KY]

Did I mention he's 9 feet and just over 40 pounds? :cool:

LOL, he is still a sick lil guy!
:rolleyes:

[TrpnBils]

I totally forgot about this post until today, but I wanted to give everybody an update on how the snake is doing and how the whole thing progressed.

About three weeks after the treatment, the tumor was completely dead, so we removed it. It was an open wound anyway from the biopsy, so it was just a matter of cutting out the last stitch and literally just popping the tumor right out. Two weeks after that, he ate again for the first time since the biopsy (this was about 2 months later), went into shed a couple of days later, and he's been hammering his rats since then. He's doing great! The tumor never returned, and now he just has some white scar tissue where the photodynamic therapy killed the tissue. He'll never have scales there again, but he's cancer-free, and that's what matters.

By the way, I'm not sure of exact numbers here, but I think this is within reach of most people if it ever becomes an issue and you feel it is worth treating the snake. A rough estimate that the vet told me was somewhere in the neighborhood of only $500.

[Nanci]

Excellent news! I'm glad he made it through therapy and it worked!

[ReptileMama4]

:dancer:That's awesome! I'm so happy to hear that your snake is doing so much better. It's hard to watch somebody you love and care about so much go through something like that, but he made it, and that's amazing. Thank you for sharing your story. It's very encouraging. I wonder if and when they'll start using this treatment for humans.:idea:

[TrpnBils]

http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Therapy/photodynamic

They have been for awhile now. From what I understand it's mostly used for facial tumors, and it only works on certain types of cancer.

[BluJugganaut]

thats great! very good to hear him get through this :)

[TrpnBils]

Hey I just wanted to give everybody an update since this is something that isn't real common to hear about and it potentially could affect any one of our animals here.

For those of you who haven't heard, I got a teaching job in January of this year and quit the zoo for good in April after the green tree python babies were finally eating and stable. During those few months, the tumor on the boa did come back slowly and was sent in for another biopsy. The results showed somewhere in the neighborhood of six different types (is that even the right word?) of cancer including the bone and muscle cancer originally seen in the first biopsy which was done when I first posted this thread last year. The tumor was surgically removed again during the second biopsy and the incision healed over and was looking good when I left in April.

This particular snake was really something to me. I was really the only one who used him because he had a tendency to hiss a lot, which scared a lot of the education people away...even some of the other reptile people were nervous around him, so I was the only one who used him for educational programs, etc (that of course ended when the tumor was first noticed). My fiancee is also an animal keeper at the zoo, so when I left, I told her I didn't want to hear about anything with the reptiles because I knew I'd just critique stuff in my head and get frustrated with stuff that I didn't have any control over (i.e. "I would have done it differently"). My only exception was that I wanted to know if that boa died because myself, the curator, and the vet all worked our butts off with this and I knew it the outcome didn't look very good.

Anyway, about a week or two ago, the snake died in the middle of the day, presumably from the cancer. He was 21 years old, so he had been around for awhile and was a fantastic example of how docile and fascinating reptiles can be, and I'd ALWAYS have people ask me where he was after I stopped using him for shows.

So anyway, the treatment didn't work, but it was very experimental and had only been tried a couple of times on reptiles out west with a moderate success rate. If you remember from my first post about the procedure, it only works if the tumor is less than 1cm thick and it only works on certain types of tumors. When we found out about the procedure, the tumor was just shy of 1cm as far as we could tell, so it just may have been too thick to be completely effective. I wouldn't completely give up on this treatment even with my involvement with this snake, but hopefully there will be better results in the future. The one thing I can say I'm proud of though is that at least he lived a long life.

[diamondlil]

Thanks for the update, shame it didn't work out but at least he had a good long life.

[JoshnJJ]

I am really surprised that he had wonderful 21 years of life.
I'm sorry to hear, it would be nice to meet him.
I thank you, for your care to your snake. :-)

[TrpnBils]

I forgot I do have one picture of him.

March 2006

[Nanci]

Well, maybe the treatment prolonged his life. He certainly lived a nice long life. RIP, Mr. Boa.