Splenic tumor

Fat tissue attached to the splenic mass.

I recently got an unexpected finding when I went to remove a foreign body from the stomach of an elderly dog, and would like to have your advice.

Briefly, a 11 y.o. boxer presented to his vet ambulatory, bright, alert and response, but his owner did witness him eating several pieces of a fly curtain.

The dog had been induced vomit by his normal vet, and did manage to vomit some pieces of the fly curtain, but a radiography revealed that there were still a lot of them sat in the stomach five hours later. 

Some blood test (biochemistry and hematology) were unremarkable, supporting that the dog in himself was stable. The only finding was a very mild anaemia (an hematocrit of 34%, when the normal range is 35-50%). 

From his vet practice the boxer was transferred to the emergency service for a night monitoring. However, after revising all the case we all decided to surgically remove the fly curtains pieces from the stomach to prevent more serious and dangerous problems if they moved forward to the intestines. To my surprise I find a large mass in the spleen that was adhered to adipose tissue, and was not bleeding from anywhere, nor I found a blood in the abdomen, as I would have expected in a ruptured mass spleen. The finding suggested that at some point in the past the splenic mass ruptured and luckily "fixed" itself to adjacent tissues, preventing a fatal internal haemorrhage without anyone noticing it.

The gastrotomy went uneventful and the pieces or curtains were removed with no issues. However, removing the spleen was not an easy task as it was attached to the fat tissue and difficulting exteriorizing the spleen to be removed. There was also a smaller mass more lateral in the spleen.

As the splenic mass was not expected, the dog's owner was immediately called and a verbal consent over the phone was given to go ahead and remove the spleen.

Despite the dog's age, he had a very quick recovery from surgery, starting eating only 6 hours post-operation.