Drug-laser therapy is promising treatment for pet cancer
August 30, 1996
Web posted at: 11:55 p.m. EDT
From Correspondent Ed Garsten
DETROIT (CNN) -- Veronique Frucot is the sort of person who
will go far to take care of her family. That's why she
didn't mind taking her cat Bulu from suburban Philadelphia to
a veterinarian in Detroit who she believes can help save the
feline's life.
Bulu has advanced cancer, and radiation treatments haven't
helped. So Frucot is going the experimental route.
"At this point, it's either that or she has a few months
left. Even now, we're not sure, because it's well advanced,
how well it's going to go," she said. "But I thought we'd
give it a try."
The experimental cancer treatment, photodynamic therapy, is a
two-part treatment in which the animal first gets a drug
injection, then a laser light activates the chemical.
"Either one alone does nothing, but when you put them
together, it's pretty fatal for cancer," said Dr. Elsa Beck,
who is treating Bulu.
She said over the past seven years she has treated close to
500 animals. Photodynamic therapy has been from 40 percent
to 95 percent successful in curing the cancer, she said,
depending on the location of the tumor.
Beck hopes her work with animals will lead to similar
treatments for humans, "as photo therapy becomes more and
more accepted. It's a one-time treatment, and the people can
be awake, as opposed to (having) 30 radiation therapy
treatments that have a lot more side effects than this does."
She feels confident of her results, partly because she says
there's a big difference in testing the procedure with
animals like Bulu and testing so-called lab animals. The
difference is that in Bulu and other pets, the cancers have
occurred spontaneously. In lab animals, the cancers are
induced for experimentation.
"Generally the pet benefits from the treatment as well, and
if we can work out some of the details on how to do the
treatment in the animals, then that saves people
experimentation and early clinical trials," Beck said.
Some of the details include coming up with proper laser
dosages for humans. It's just one of those cases where
medicine for man's (and woman's) best friends may also help
save human lives.
As for Bulu, Beck said, "In my mind it already looks better."
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