Putter is a 9 year and 10 months old male Labrador mix. He was diagnosed with Hemangiosarcoma (Blood cancer) 10 months ago. On that traumatic day, Putter was fine in the morning. When we tried to take him for his afternoon walk, he did not want to go and lied down. We took him right away to the bet.

We were told that he had Hemangiosarcoma (worst cancer to have since it was in his blood) of the spleen which had ruptured. His other organs were healthy. Without surgery to remove his spleen, he would pass very soon. The Vet felt that Putter was a good candidate if we decided to operate. 　　　　　Yet even with the surgery, Putter was given only 3-4 months to live because of the type of cancer. We decided to go ahead with the surgery to have his spleen removed.

During his surgery, Putter’s heart stopped and he needed to be resuscitated. He stayed at the hospital for one week. During that week, Putter refused to eat (no matter what we or they gave him). Since he was a mood eater, we took him home and made him homemade food.

A friend of Gilbert knew of Dr. Raymond Yoa treating her relative’s dog. We brought Putter to see Dr. Yoza and decided to bring him weekly. While meeting with Dr. Yoza, we saw in one of the pet magazines that does/cat with cancer should not eat grains and Solid Gold food could help fight cancer. We went to Crazy Canine to buy the food and switch all of our dogs to Solid Gold. Our dogs do not get any grain products.

When we met with Putter’s Vet for a follow up visit for staple removal, she had an oncologist review his case. He gave us our options of chemo inject able ($5000) or oral ($3000) medications or no treatment. With the chemo option, he would be radioactive and have special care needs. Life expectancy would only be 1-3 months (without chemo) and 4 months (with chemo). We were told that the cancer would spread to his other organs anyway since the cancer was in his blood. We decided against chemo because we wanted Putter to have quality of life and not spend what time he had sick. We stopped any more exploratory surgeries or tests regarding his cancer. We also had another dog Max (two years older than Putter) who developed the same diagnosis a few months later. Due to Max’s age, health and vet recommendation, we decided to have him put down.

We brought Putter weekly to Dr. Yoza for the past 10 months. Putter has not had to visit the vet since his surgery. We noticed that Putter has more energy, better appetite and acts like a puppy again. He looks forward to Saturdays and loves Dr. Yoza and all of his fiends there. The people and environment are very peaceful and relaxing. It has been comforting to hear from Dr. Yoza about others who have pets with cancer and gives us continual hope. When Putter sees Dr. Yoza, he wags his tail and lies on his side or his treatments. We are very happy with the results that the treatments have on Putter and lucky to have found Dr. Yoza. Putter has the quality of life that we hoped and wished for.

Gilbert and Cori