Mon., May 23, 2011 - Options for nasal drainage and MACH watch

When I went for Hardee's last chemo appointment, I talked to Dr P about the increased nasal drainage problems that we were having.  When Hardee is awake, he can swallow the drainage that goes down the back of his throat, or we can wipe or he licks the drainage away coming out the front of his nose.  But when Hardee tries to sleep, it becomes problematic.  Sometimes in the middle of the night, Hardee will jump up struggling to breathe because of all the drainage going down the back of his throat.  A couple mornings Hardee even vomited trying to clear his airway to breathe.  His vomit was just a bunch of snot.  Dr P gave me 3 options to see if we could slow the nasal drainage.

The first option was antibiotics.  We could put Hardee on antibiotics to see if it slowed the drainage.  If it worked, we could change him to an antibiotic that he could stay on long term.

Option two was prednisone.  I don't like the long term use of steroids because of the damage they do, but Dr P assured me that we could adjust the dosage down, if it worked to slow the drainage, that Hardee could stay on long term.  He said he has numerous dogs that have been on low dose prednisone for years.

The last option was surgery.  Dr P said that he could go up the front of Hardee's nose with forceps and try and pull out as much tumor as he could to see if that produced less drainage.  I said "absolutely, No" to that option.  Back in Nov. when we went to CT scan again after radiation, I had Dr P do another biopsy to make sure we were dealing with the original diagnosis.  Two weeks later, I CT scanned again to see what the tumor was doing to make a decision about starting chemo, and the tumor had grown significantly in those 2 weeks.  Further research on my part found evidence that cutting into the tumor can send it into hyper drive growth.  So, no one is ever touching that tumor again!!

I decided to try the antibiotics first.  I got the prescription filled, but I just haven't started Hardee on them yet.  We have been going through a manageable period now with the drainage, so I will wait until the drainage gets bad again to start the antibiotics.

Onto one of my favorite subjects, agility.  For those not involved in the sport, the dog and handler need 20 double qualifying runs (qualifying in both of their runs in the same day) and 750 speed points for his Master Agility Championship (MACH).  Hardee has had all his points for quite some time and is now working on his QQs (double qualifying runs).  Hardee and Jim are at # 19 now and just need one more.  We hope to get his MACH at this weekend's trial.  It would be a perfect weekend to finish their MACH at a Memorial Day trial because Jim is a veteran, and also because our club, the Southern California Portuguese Water Dog Club, is sponsoring the trial.  I hope I haven't jinxed their chances now by writing about it.  Keep your fingers and paws crossed for Jim and Hardee!  They so deserve this and have worked so hard for it.  We are definitely on MACH watch!

Until then, it is all about joy and all about Hardee! 

Have a great holiday weekend everyone, and take a second to remember those who served and died for your freedom.

Wed., May 18, 2011 - Another fabulous performance weekend and chemo

The beginning of May, we went to Utah for agility and obedience.  The first day of the trial, Hardee finished an obedience title by qualifying, with a 1st place, in Open A obedience.  Also the same day, with his obedience competition in between his runs, Hardee ran agility and qualifed in both of his runs for his 16th QQ towards his MACH (Master Agility Champion).  The next days, he also got his 17th and 18th QQs (out of the 20 QQs that he needs).  Historically, we haven't had the greatest luck in Utah, but this was a once in a lifetime fabulous trial result, and we were very pleased!  It was chilly there, but beautiful.

Also, what made the trip to Utah so wonderful was that I met up with a couple of old friends.  One from my growing up days, and it was a pleasure to see her again.  She loves dogs also, and she loved meeting Hardee in person, instead of just reading about him.  I hope to see her again sometime soon!  I also had another friend come out and watch Hardee's obedience competition and watch him run agility.  She cheered us on, and stayed the whole day, waiting for Hardee's turns to come up.  Cathy and her husband came back out on Sunday to watch a little more agility.  It was good to see her again too!

Currently, Hardee is doing good.  We are having a little bit of drainage problems from his nose, but nothing that we can't handle.  We are reviewing different options to see if we can somehow slow down the amount of drainage.  I had a long talk with Dr P (radiation oncologist) about a couple things, and he has renewed my optimism about Hardee's near future.

This past Monday, Hardee had I.V. chemo again.  It was carboplatin again, and I was a little nervous since the last time HH had carboplatin he had a reaction.  I premedicated him in the parking lot before I brought him inside the oncologists for chemo.  We've had a couple problems, but once again, nothing that we can't handle.

For us, it's agility, agility, and more agility.  Water practice has started, but we are waiting for it to warm up more before we take Hardee to the lake.  Until then, it is all about joy and all about Hardee!  You know we wouldn't have it any other way.