This is George, he is a geriatric male neutered Domestic Long-Haired rescue cat who presented with a few weeks history of tachypnea and excessive sneezing.
The referring veterinary surgeon performed radiographs and confirmed a large mass occupying over half of his chest cavity and a moderate volume pleural effusion. The effusion was drained and a fine needle aspirate taken from the mass, was suspicious of neoplasia (suspected thymoma).
Chest radiograph taken by the referring veterinary surgeon. The orange arrows show the large thoracic mass.
He was referred to Bristol Vet Specialists and saw Elinor Field and Julie Hennet from the soft tissue team. Diagnostic tests were performed including a CT scan and fine needle aspirates. The aspirates were taken under ultrasound guidance by our specialist imager Dawn Sutton. Our oncology specialist Owen Davies was consulted and looked at the samples taken in house. These samples together with the imaging findings (large (11cm x 6cm) lobulated cystic mediastinal mass with no evidence of metastasis) were highly suspicious of a Thymoma.
CT scan of the chest: orange arrows – chest mass, purple arrows – heart, blue arrows pleural effusion and the green arrows show the compressed lungs.
George’s tachypnea temporarily improved following drainage but quickly worsened and after discussion with Elinor and Julie, George’s owner elected for surgery. Our specialist anaesthesia team Jo Murrell and Carly Kilby anaesthetised him and a median sternotomy was performed. The mass was removed successfully after several hours of challenging surgery and anaesthesia.
George recovered uneventfully from the surgery in our ICU department and was discharged after a few days in the hospital.
George has now fully recovered from surgery and is back to normal, he is just waiting for his hair to grow back!!
