Have you noticed a lump or bump that has suddenly come up on your pet? Or perhaps it has been there for several months with no real change. I recently noticed a small mass only about 1 cm in size on my 2-year-old Golden Retriever. I decided to take what’s called a fine needle aspirate of the mass to see if I could collect any cellular material and hopefully have a shot at identifying the type of mass that it was. Fortunately, I was successful and found that my 2-year-old dog had a Mast Cell Tumor, which is a malignant tumor. I scheduled her surgery as soon as possible to have it removed and sent it out for biopsy to confirm my diagnosis and grade the tumor. Luckily for her (and me) it turned out to be a low grade Mast Cell Tumor that was curative by complete surgical excision. Had I let it go on longer, her prognosis may not have been as good, as it was already beginning to infiltrate the surrounding tissue.
I share this experience with you in hopes to show you that it is always worth trying to identify a mass, because even the smallest, softest, roundest masses no matter the pet’s age can turn out to be malignant. I think it’s often easy to assume that a soft mass under the skin is a lipoma, or fatty tumor, but Mast Cell Tumors often hide within lipomas or can present just like a lipoma.
In office, we can perform a fine needle aspiration where we place a needle within the mass in hopes to aspirate cellular content. We can put this content on a slide and try to identify the cells. Now, these aspirations are not always successful and do not confirm a definitive diagnosis, but it is an inexpensive way for us to try and decide if we want to continue monitoring or if we want to schedule surgical removal.