older dog w/ multiple issues

Question
Hi Patti - My almost 15yr old 30lb mixed breed dog, Jack has a great vet who has diagnosed him w/an enlarged heart as well as a large fatty tumor in his lung. He is on furosemide, a diuretic, to ease his cough which is helping.
I read w/ interest your answer on low sodium diets.  My question is  - How far do I go w/continued diagnosis for the tumor? The vet would like to retest for cancer again
after 1 month which is soon.  Besides being expensive and invasive, I worry that Jack will not recover anyway even if it is cancer because I do not plan to do chemo - but of course I want to give him the best palliative care possible.  How important is retesting? Thanks so much, Sally

Answer
Hi Sally,

I'm sorry to hear of your dog illness.

You didn't say the specific kind of cancer your dog has been diagnosed with, but lung cancers in dogs don't usually have a very good prognosis. I don't know what the re-testing for your dog's condition entails, but if continued testing is invasive and expensive, it might not be of much help for a 15 year old dog, since you're not opting for chemo therapy.

Simply keeping your dog as comfortable as possible, by giving him the best possible quality of life for however long he has, may make more sense. Talk to your vet about pain relief medications, even if you are not currently seeing signs of pain. It is reasonable to presume that some pain is present when there are malignant tumors.

I'd continue with the low sodium diet, it's helpful for the heart condition. Going off a low sodium diet can put more stress on your dog's heart, which can mean discomfort.

Feel free to get back to me if I can be of further help.

Best of luck,
Patti