4 year old female diagnosed with soft tissue sarcoma (cancer)

Hello! I'm new to this website and have so far found it very helpful. I am hoping to find some answers about Vitality Science, a US brand that focuses on holistic cat care. My 4 year old rescue kitty, a tuxedo named Norman, has recently been diagnosed with soft tissue sarcoma. We found a lump behind her ear that the vet removed, biopsied and diagnosed as a soft tissue sarcoma and low grade at that. We went to a specialist (oncologist) who did an x ray of the chest to verify the cancer hadn't spread that far, a full blood panel and a fine needle fluid extraction of a swollen lymph node. So far, and after seeing 3 vets and spending $1500, all we know is that Norman had a cancerous lump removed but the x rays came back clear and the blood panel also came back clear. The swollen lymph node was full of a fluid the oncologist could not identify. In the last 2 days, my Normans lymph node has gotten slightly more swollen and so has the left side of his face (same side as the bad lymph node). The vets cant tell me anything. I've decided to switch him from Go! cat food, which is pretty good stuff, to a raw organic diet. 

Whew, basically, I would like to know if anyone else has any experience with this sort of thing of thing and if anyone has used Vitality Science for this type of cancer? Any help/stories/suggestions are helpful =) 

Hello and welcome to this Forum. 

I am a human doctor, not a vet, and any advice that I give you about a cat should be checked with a veterinarian.   However, from my long experience in human medicine, as malignancies in cats are similar to malignancies in humans, I can advise you not to waste your money, your expectations nor hopes with  Vitality Science in the treatment of a sarcoma.   I am a semi-retired specialist in General Internal Medicine and cannot tell you how often human patients with malignancies have asked me about so-called "Holistic Medicine" as a treatment.  Quacks prey on humans as well as animals and I feel strongly about quacks raising hopes with treatments that cannot succeed.

Cat Sarcomas are malignant tumours that do not respond to "natural" treatments and it is cruel to raise the patient's owner's hopes.  Feline sarcomas may respond to treatments prescribed by your veterinarian, more so early in the disease, but relying on quack remedies that call themselves "Natural" or "Holistic" may cause your poor cat to lose precious time and may cause unnecessary suffering.  These treatments do nothing for pain relief.

I cannot advise on the outlook, you should be advised by your vet, but sarcomas, like most malignancies, can occasionally cure themselves spontaneously depending on the cat's immunity, and the phrase "Advanced Immunity Restoration" used by Vitality Science is just Gobbledegook!    Your cat has a fatal disease, albeit a low grade one, and he  should be treated by your vet who will know what he is doing and whose treatment will be guided by clinical trials.  Don't let Norman lose any chance of recovery by your leaving your veterinarian.  I must advise you that, although veterinary treatment of malignancies is expensive, this is the only chance of Norman's recovery.  Euthanasia is the only alternative and is is to be avoided as much as possible in a four year old cat.

I cannot comment about diet in cats,  you should discuss this with your vet.  In general in humans, diet does not make any difference to the treatment of malignancies, despite many vocal claims to the opposite.

With best wishes, and please keep us informed,

Geoffrey

Geoffrey, 

    Thank you so much for such a through reply. I had suspected as much about vitality science, sadly. It seemed like too much of a miracle cure to be real. As I understand it, some of their medication for kitty diarrhea is effective but information on their cancer care products (especially reviews) are vague at best. The frustrating part is that the oncologist cant recommend anything right now. As I mentioned, his gland on his neck is swollen but the vet had just removed stitches from that side of his face. Also, he has just spent a week 'glamping' with us at a fair where he went for walks and ate some rough textured alfalfa.

    Because of this, the vet couldn't say why his gland was swollen and the only thing she could tentatively suggest as surgery to remove the gland but she also wasn't positive it was necessary to do so. Because none of his test came back with results that could indicate cancer, the vets are scratching their heads and saying that Norman 'is an odd case' and they arnt sure what to do especially because he isn't displaying any physical signs of discomfort and his habits have remained the same. Any ideas or thoughts? We are going back to the vet tomorrow to discuss the oncologist findings too, to see if they have any ideas yet. 

A question I hope you can elaborate on: you mention how sarcomas can sometimes cure themselves depending on the cats immunity. Do you think a ketogenic diet would improve his immunity, especially if his immunity used to be great?

Thank you so much for your information and insight. I appreciate all the help and so does Norman  

I don't know that feeding raw will be the "magic cure", but I do know that one of our members had a cat with Lymphoma, and she was feeding him raw while he went thru Chemo, and he ended up living about 3 or 4 times longer than expected.  No one can say why this was, but he did.  He was also taking Chinese Herbs while on Chemo, and probably afterwards.

Maybe some of the information in this thread will be helpful to you.  It starts out with "the benefits of a raw diet":  http://www.thecatsite.com/t/264154/raw-feeding-resources

Hopefully these swollen lymph nodes are NOT cancerous

Norman4ever said:

 
Geoffrey, 

    Thank you so much for such a through reply. I had suspected as much about vitality science, sadly. It seemed like too much of a miracle cure to be real. As I understand it, some of their medication for kitty diarrhea is effective but information on their cancer care products (especially reviews) are vague at best. The frustrating part is that the oncologist cant recommend anything right now. As I mentioned, his gland on his neck is swollen but the vet had just removed stitches from that side of his face. Also, he has just spent a week 'glamping' with us at a fair where he went for walks and ate some rough textured alfalfa.

    Because of this, the vet couldn't say why his gland was swollen and the only thing she could tentatively suggest as surgery to remove the gland but she also wasn't positive it was necessary to do so. Because none of his test came back with results that could indicate cancer, the vets are scratching their heads and saying that Norman 'is an odd case' and they arnt sure what to do especially because he isn't displaying any physical signs of discomfort and his habits have remained the same. Any ideas or thoughts? We are going back to the vet tomorrow to discuss the oncologist findings too, to see if they have any ideas yet. 

A question I hope you can elaborate on: you mention how sarcomas can sometimes cure themselves depending on the cats immunity. Do you think a ketogenic diet would improve his immunity, especially if his immunity used to be great?

Thank you so much for your information and insight. I appreciate all the help and so does Norman  

Click to expand...

From what you have written about what the vets said and the behaviour of Norman, I would consider a waiting treatment to be the best option, but the opinion of the feline oncologist is worth a great deal more than a human doctor who has not examined Norman.

You wrote  <A question I hope you can elaborate on: you mention how sarcomas can sometimes cure themselves depending on the cats immunity. Do you think a ketogenic diet would improve his immunity, especially if his immunity used to be great?>  

I am sorry but I cannot answer why cancers spontaneously improve.  I assume it is because of immunity to the cancer but why some cancers have this capacity to heal themselves and others become highly invasive is something that I do not understand! 

The phenomenon is exceedingly rare and I have been in practice for over 60 years and have seen only two fully documented human patients who have recovered spontaneously.  I know of nothing that they had in common.   One was an alcoholic with a carcinoma of the lung and one was a Pastor's wife with a malignant melanoma (who considered that her cure was due to prayer). She had a liver full of secondaries that disappeared spontaneously.  Incidentally I have seen very many others, it must be in the hundreds, who also prayed for a cure, but they never had one. 

I doubt very much that a ketogenic diet has ever been shown to produce any improvement in immunity, nor indeed any has other sort of diet.  Indeed I would avoid such a diet as ketosis is a very uncomfortable condition!

With best wishes,

Geoffrey

I am sorry your cat has come down with a tumor.

Did the vet want to try prednisolone to keep the tumor from growing? sometimes=its a 50/50 shot. There have been studies done that show that pred helps slow down the growth=it doesn't kill it=just keeps it in check and stops it from growing. Where its low grade-sounds to me like small cell if that's what they meant. Did they mention lymphoma at all or just sarcoma? I don't have experience with sarcoma but I do know people who cats were on pred for cancer and it bought some time. Maybe ask about pred?