Missy

Question
Missy, one of my PEWs I got from snake food tank in early spring 2008, had mammary tumor removed in late Sept. 2008. Before the incision even completely healed, it began to grow again. It is now bitten open because her brother and adoring cage mate Rascal decided to take matters into his own hands and remove it (overgroomed it) himself. I called & left msg for vet today, not sure if it has gotten infected but put some peroxide on it last night, it was oozing. I want to have it removed (costs about $320) but fear even if she makes it thru the surgery, it will come back like before. She is intact and otherwise seems in excellent health. Any other suggestions please! Thank you.

Answer
I HATE MAMMARY TUMORS!!!!!!!

How old is she?  Thats important for me to know.  I would remove this tumor and if she is young enough to make a difference I would opt for a spay.
You expressed fear in the fact if she survives surgery or not, which makes me worry why you would fear that?  Is the vet an exotics specialist rather than a vet that sees exotics?  Thats a pretty high price to pay for 1 tumor. Do they keep her over night?

Unfortunately, these mammary tumors grow back, some right before the stitches have even fallen out of the first tumor that was removed. Yes its frustrating. This is why I wont own any more females unless I spay them and this must be done early, around 3 to 5 months old, for it to really make a difference. Otherwise, an intact female has a 75% chance of developing mammary tumors after menopause which is from 18 months and older. High estrogen levels are to blame. Once the rats estrus cycle ends, the estrogen skyrockets and tumors start to pop pop pop everywhere. Some people have said their rat had ONE and it was removed and that was it.  Chances it was NOT mammary related in that case were high.

There are a few things you can do though. Spay and hope this slows down estrogen production. On top of spaying, if the vet is up to date on exotic care, he or she should know about the use of two types of drugs that are being used with success in treating mammary tumors. Both are hormones that stop the production of estrogen. Tamoxifen is one drug and in fact it is used in humans to prevent the growth or return of breast cancer. Tamoxifen is used orally once a day. The thing is though, the rats tumors must be malignant for the tamoxifen to work. This means more money for a biopsy and   also hopes that if the other tumors grow they will be malignant too or it wont work. The good news is most of the time mammary tumors are benign. Thats when Lupron comes in. Lupron is another hormone which is given in the form of an injection once per month. This stops estrogen production and stops the growth of benign mammary tumors and has said to even shrink existing benign growths as well.  Some vets have heard of using both, some have never heard of using either drug which means the vet is not up to par with his exotics since these two drugs have been widely praised in the exotic mammal world.

I ran into this problem of returning tumors on the last female I ever owned.  I lost her last July, 2007. She was 2 months shy of her 4th birthday.  Holly had several surgeris and much to my horror, the tumors kept popping back up, sometimes two and three at a time. I was devastated.  I decided she had gone through enough and at three years old I said NO MORE!  I let her go and after a month the tumor was so huge her tiny body could not walk. Her feet hardly touched the ground of the cage. She had lost so much weight yet she was so determined to survive, she would propel around on her belly to get to her food and even used her  litter box. I knew I had to let her go so she would not suffer.  I just couldnt do it. The vet stared at her, looked at me, stared and her and finally she said: "I cant do it either. She isnt ready to die"!  We decided to go ahead and remove the ugly monsterous tumor.  If she did not make it through the surgery due to her very frail state, I was going to let her go anyhow, so it didnt make sense to at least try to save her one last time. He gave her a 5% chance to make it. I kissed her goodbye and although my vet is one of the top exotic vets in this part of the south, I thought I would never see her again. Not with those terrible odds.
Well guess what?  She beat those odds and she lived through a 90 minute procedure which is a LONG time to be under when your that tiny and frail. She lost some blood too which scared the vet for a minute there since hit nicked a major artery right off the bat when he first opened her. HE clamped it and it didnt hold and blood started to pulsate out. He clamped her again and thought NO WAY AM I LOSING YOU NOW LITTLE ONE!  and she made it.
However, he found a total of 5 more tumors that he just could not get. They were not huge but they were still there which did not upset me because I knew I had more time with her.
We started her on lupron and those tumors began to shrink too                                                                                      She was old though and healing took longer than normal and she was so thin and frail. We worked on getting her body healthy again. Holly several more months and passed away 2 months before her 4th birthday. If I did not do the surgery and put her down instead that day, I would have missed out on at least  4 or more months with her. I have no regrets about doing the final surgery.
So thats my story about Holly. I also have alot of info on my site about mammary tumors here:

http://www.freewebs.com/crittercity/allabouttumors.htm

Let me know what you think!