Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Dog with malignant chest tumor invading spinal cord causing weakness
By Rizzo, Scott A et al.·Published in Journal of veterinary diagnostic investigation : official publication of the American Association of Veterinary Laboratory Diagnosticians, Inc·2008·Department of Small Animal Clinical Sciences, United States·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Malignant mediastinal extra-adrenal paraganglioma with spinal cord invasion in a dog.
- Species:
- dog
Plain-English summary
A 1.5-year-old male mixed-breed dog was brought to the vet after showing signs of lethargy, stiffness, and difficulty using his back legs for two weeks. Imaging tests revealed a mass in the chest area that was pressing on the spinal cord. Unfortunately, the dog was diagnosed with a rare type of tumor called a paraganglioma, which can affect nerve function. Despite the efforts to understand the tumor better, it was determined to be invasive and ultimately led to the dog's passing.
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Abstract
A 1.5-year-old castrated, male, mixed-breed dog was evaluated because of a 2-week history of lethargy, stiffness, and progressive paraparesis. Spinal radiographs, myelography, and computed tomography of the region showed a locally invasive mass involving the thoracic wall. Upon necropsy, an encapsulated, fluctuant mass was noted attached to the right dorsal body wall in the region of the fifth to seventh thoracic vertebra. Churukian-Schenk staining revealed positive granules within the neoplastic cell cytoplasm and immunohistochemistry was positive for expression for cytoplasmic neuron-specific enolase and synaptophysin. Chromogranin A and S100 expression were found to be negative. Immunohistochemistry and silver staining did not allow further differentiation of the tumor, and the diagnosis remains consistent with either a chromaffin paraganglioma or a nonchromaffin paraganglioma (chemodectoma) with some production of catecholamines. Extra-adrenal paragangliomas are rare neoplasms in dogs but should be considered as a possible differential diagnosis for a primary paraspinal thoracic mass.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18460631/