Ellie

By Jill Goodwin-Helgerson

July 22, 2010

I wanted Ellie before Ellie was conceived. Having grown up with dogs my whole life, I fell in love with the Saint Bernard breed when a high school friend got one my Freshman year. I loved everything about that dog...especially the head. They just have the most amazing, beautiful heads! When I moved to Utah to marry the guy I had fallen in love with, I had three demands;

1. We have to get a dog.
2. It has to be the dog I choose.
3. We'll need to get a place to have the dog because I want a Saint Bernard!

Little did my husband know that I had already been researching the breed and breeders for a few years! At the time, I had already found the perfect match. After looking into all the possible health concerns, I was really worried about finding a reputable breeder to avoid the possibility of seizures, a sad reality of the over-breeding of Saint Bernards. Suffice it to say I did my homework and found a breeder I thought was the best fit with the best health records for 7 generations of Bernards. I was in the loop every step of the way from notification that Cleo, Ellie’s mom, was pregnant, to progress reports on the pups. After eight weeks of waiting, we were driving home with my dream come true - Ellie!

Ellie seemed to have the desire from day one to create the biggest vet file in history. She had so many random health issues - stomach problems, broken toe, scrolled eye tissue, etc. She even reacted to the internal sutures after her spay. It didn't seem to matter though, we were in love.

I have truly never met a dog with such an understanding of the English language. Very smart and very stubborn - true to the breed temperament. My husband, who never had a dog before and was not sure about the whole giant breed experience, was completely wrapped around Ellie's big paw. It didn't seem to matter that she was costing us an arm and a leg or that we had broken every
pre-established rule. Ellie was the queen of our world.

One day, right after Ellie's 3rd birthday, we noticed that she was running a little bit weird. Neither of us could quite put our finger on what was different, we just knew it looked weird. We happened to have an appointment with the vet that day and we mentioned the motion issue to him. Dr. Israelson studied Ellie out in the grass for a little while and after several minutes of massaging and feeling all limbs, found a tiny lump deep under the tissue on the front of her left rear ankle. The lump moved and was really hard to find so the advice was to keep a close eye on it. A month later we were back at the vet. The lump had definitely become easier to find and did not move around as it had before. We were worried. The recommendation was surgery to remove it and have the sample submitted for evaluation by a pathologist. After careful consideration we decided to proceed with surgery.

I got the worst phone call of my life that day. Dr. Hillegass (our other vet) was in the operating room with Ellie on the table. She explained that she had the open tissue in front of her and that it didn't look good. Due to the nerves and ligaments in that area, she recommended a biopsy of the mass. Further removal would have to be done by a specialist.

The rest of that month was a complete rollercoaster ride. It seemed like we waited forever just to find that the initial results revealed that the mass was more than likely cancer. Then the samples were sent to CSU and we waited. We couldn't believe that this seemingly perfectly healthy dog that was only 3 years old could be facing cancer. And what did that mean...amputation, surgery, chemotherapy? We got the results from CSU right before Christmas - Peripheral Nerve Sheath Sarcoma. Our vets recommended CSU for treatment so we made an appointment to have Ellie evaluated. We also made an appointment at another facility in Denver so that we could get two opinions on treatment. CSU offered to do surgery to remove the tumor followed by a month of radiation with an 80% chance of it not coming back. The other facility only wanted to do amputation and we just weren't ready to take that leap. Ellie loves to run and she seemed too healthy and young for such a drastic step. It meant everything for us to preserve Ellie's quality of life. We went with the 80% option of surgery and radiation.

The surgery happened the next day! Dr. Dernell, a surgical oncologist, removed what he thought was about 80-90% of the mass. Due to the location, it was impossible to get clean margins and the mass was wrapped around several nerves and tendons. Another biopsy was performed during this surgery and this result said "Synovial Cell Sarcoma". We took Ellie home for what was supposed to be a two week healing period before her month long radiation protocol. Ellie being Ellie, two weeks turned into four weeks due to surgical complications. She developed a seroma, a fluid filled pouch, on her leg because of the two surgeries in the same area in such a short time frame.

As soon as she was ready, Ellie was back to Colorado to start the radiation protocol of eighteen treatments. Due to the seroma, this would be a new challenge for everyone involved, but we were all prepared to deal with things as they came up. Of course, like the special creature that she is, Ellie had radiation complications by the end of the first week. Her skin started to burn within days and she reacted poorly to the pain patch that we tried. We took special care to do everything we could to support her through the process. We saw Dr. Narda Robinson for acupuncture for the pain, changed her to a high protein diet, and made sure to spend a lot of time loving on her every chance we got. 

Daily anesthesia and radiation therapy is a lot on the body and at about 14 treatments Ellie decided she’d had enough. This is a dog that is big enough to say no and really mean it and that's exactly what she did. She layed down and refused to go back for the treatments. After one day of physically forcing her to go, I couldn't do it either. I met with Dr. Susan LaRue, Ellie’s radiation oncologist, and we decided to give Ellie a break for a couple of days. It wasn't part of the protocol, but I didn't really care. At that point, I wasn't so sure I was doing what was best for Ellie and I was worried she wasn't going to make it. Her spirit just seemed broken.

We took our break and headed back to CSU to try to finish treatments and amazingly, Ellie was a whole different dog. A few more treatments and we were done. We still had to deal with the severe burns and the seroma fluid from her surgery, but the treatments were over. It was actually really hard to leave CSU and trust that I could care for Ellie on my own.

I'd like to say that we had no struggles, but again, Ellie doesn't do anything easy. She had a reaction (focal motor seizures) about a month out to all the medications she was on and we had to take her off of all of her medications. Her burns took over two months to be completely healed and the seroma took even longer. This process was tedious and involved soaks for the burns and two bandages a day for the seroma.

The vets at CSU checked in a few times after we left to see how our special girl was doing. I'll never forget that because I knew how busy they were and yet, they really did seem to care about each and every patient.

Ellie is now five years old and two years out from treatment. She seems healthier and happier then she has ever been in her entire life. It would be a lie to say that I knew we were doing the right thing during the entire process of treatment. However, I am 100% positive that we did the right thing now. She loves to eat, she loves to play with her sister and she still loves to run! Without the wonderful people at the CSU Animal Cancer Center, she wouldn't be able to enjoy life to the fullest today. It's truly a miracle that we appreciate each and every day.

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