Dear Mary:
 
>I'm back, first I've got ECE in the house, now we've got Juvenile
>lymphosarcoma (hope I spelled that right).  Our 2 year old female Freya
>just had two blood tests come up with successively higher lymphocyte
>counts (4100 the 1st time, 6300 the second) and high white blood cell
>counts both times.  I don't want to get exploratory done to make sure,
>the doc is pretty sure, all signs point to it, and I don't want what's
>left of her life spent recovering.  From what I have read so far on the
>net, there is not much that can be done for JL except spoil the kid
>rotten and give prednisone for certain symptoms.
 
Not wanting to second guess your vet (boy I seem to be questioning symptoms
a lot lately, aren't I?), but what symptoms is Freya showing?  Has she had
diarrhea like the others?
 
The reason I ask is the ECE can result in an elevation of peripheral
lymphocytes due to the marked intestinal inflammation that the virus
causes in the intestine.  It's not much at first, but it does rise with
time, peaking at several weeks to a month after infection.
 
With JL, you don't need an exploratory to make the diagnosis.  X-rays
showing enlarged liver, spleen, and often a mass in the chest in the area
of the thymus (immediately in front of the heart) are seen in many cases
of JL, and for a definitive diagnosis, a needle aspirate of the spleen is
often all that is needed.
 
Here is the golden rule with lymphoma - you can't diagnose it based solely
on blood results.  You'll be wrong most of the time.  An aspirate, or
preferably a biopsy which definitively demostrates the lymphoma is the
only way to go.
 
With kindest regards,
Bruce Williams, DVM
[Posted in FML issue 3287]