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Peer-reviewed veterinary case report

Genitourinary rhabdomyosarcoma causing severe bleeding in young dog

By Bae, I-H et al.·Published in Veterinary pathology·2007·Department of Veterinary Pathology, South Korea·View original on PubMed

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Original publication title: Genitourinary rhabdomyosarcoma with systemic metastasis in a young dog.

Species:
dog

Plain-English summary

A 2-year-old female Golden Retriever was brought to the vet because she was very lethargic, had fluid buildup in her abdomen, was having trouble urinating, and was experiencing severe vaginal bleeding. Sadly, after she passed away, a thorough examination revealed that she had a type of cancer called rhabdomyosarcoma, which had spread to multiple organs including her lungs and liver. The cancer caused significant changes in her reproductive and urinary systems, leading to her symptoms. Unfortunately, due to the advanced stage of the disease, there were no effective treatments available, and she did not survive.

People also search for: Golden Retriever vaginal bleeding · dog abdominal swelling · rhabdomyosarcoma in dogs · dog cancer symptoms · young dog lethargy causes

Abstract

A 2-year-old intact female Golden Retriever presented due to rapidly progressing depression, ascites, dysuria, abdominal pain, and severe vaginal bleeding. At necropsy, the retroperitoneal space was expanded by multiple coalescing neoplastic nodules and the uterine wall was thickened with poorly defined neoplastic infiltrates. The urinary bladder was markedly thickened due to botryoid nodules exhibiting exophytic growth into the lumen. Metastases to lung, liver, kidney, and abdominal and thoracic lymph nodes were also noted. Microscopically, the genital tract and retroperitoneal masses were consistent with the alveolar subtype of rhabdomysarcoma, while the urinary bladder mass had characteristics of the embryonal subtype. Immunohistochemically, the neoplastic cells in all these tissue sites were intensely positive for desmin, sacromeric actin, and vimentin, while they were uniformly negative for cytokeratin and smooth muscle actin. Phosphotungstic acid hematoxylin stain revealed cross-striations in the cytoplasm of scattered neoplastic cells. Based on the gross findings, histopathology, and immunohistochemistry, genitourinary rhabdomyosarcoma with multisystemic metastases was made.

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Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17606514/