Chica was a Black Kelpie born on a farming property in WA. She was a very active and very smart little dog with and incredible capacity to respond to your mood.
We got Chica when we were living in rural WA having returned from 5 years living in Peru where we had to leave our family dog. She was named Chica as it means little girl in Spanish.
We went to a farmer’s market and our daughter’s friend had a litter of puppies for sale. Chica was being pushed around in pram with a baby’s bonnet on. We bought her for $25 and the farmer threw in a couple of bales of hay. He regretted that decision later when she turned out to be a very good herding dog.
Chica’s favourite thing to do was to be by your feet in the paddock “helping” with whatever we were doing! She was diagnosed with lymphoma in April 2021 when I took her for a check-up as she had a small lump on her face and had been a little under the weather.
When she was diagnosed, we began looking for alternatives to chemotherapy. My vet had heard about the Monepantel trial and researched it for me before referring us to the Animal Referral Hospital in Brisbane, which was participating in the trial.
The trial was very straight-forward, clearly explained and did not require much from us in terms of input or reporting; just a simple diary and to give the medication (tablet) every second day.
Unfortunately, we had to have Chica put to sleep on October 10th. Until the last week she was almost completely normal, with occasional periods of quieter behaviour than unusual.
She was originally given 2 – 4 weeks to live and went on to have a great quality of life for nearly six months, so we are very grateful.
My advice to other pet owners is early detection and knowing what is and isn’t normal for your dog is important. Diagnosing the lymphoma early gave us time to do something about it to slow it down.
The trial gave us an alternative to chemo (which wasn’t an option for us), slowed the progression and gave us more time with Chica. We would really like to support the trial to continue as I really think it gave us a significant increase in time and quality of life for Chica. I’d love to see others have the same opportunity without the invasive treatment of chemo.
Gemma, Brisbane
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