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Weird Lump on My Husky's Head????


Krys Smith

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So I just rescued this full blooded husky from these peoples house. His name was Hoss (we named him Boss it's a little less uncivilized lol) and we noticed besides being completely emaciated he's got this rather large mass in the middle of his head. It's very hard like a bone, in fact I'm almost positive it is a bone. It doesn't hurt him at all we poked at it quite a bit and he didn't seem bothered by it. But it does worry me and my husband... any one know what it may be??

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If I wanted to wait until I brought him to the vet I wouldn't be asking now. I kind of want to know before two weeks from now. Forgive me if I can't find a couple hundred dollars to pull out of my wallet after spending over 100 already the day I rescued him (that'd be today) on his 100 ft diameter runner, shelter, dog food, clippers, de-wormer, chew toys, and puppy pads. I didn't exactly expect to find a severely abused and neglected dog today so it'll take a little bit of time to pull all of the money out of my butt that it's going to cost for the heart worm exam, parasite exam, all needed shots, and the xrays they're probably going to want. I can't really give a picture of it though you can't even tell how skinny he is because of his thick coat and longgggg hair so it's impossible to take a picture of it :/

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I did some easy research though and found that it's called a knowledge bump and it's quite normal to find in herding dogs and golden retrievers but other types of dogs can get them too. Looks like I won't have to pay for xrays that's a plus I feel much better about it now though I was worried it was some kind of bone cancer or something xD Phew.

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The problem is, I don't believe we have even one veterinarian on the forum. Some of us have a fair amount of experience, but without being able to see or feel what you can, it's very hard to make a guess. Having some idea how old the dog is - young/old/in between - would be more helpful, too, as most cancers aren't terribly common (although they DO occur) in younger dogs, so while you said it's a "knowledge bump" by what you've seen online, we wouldn't have been able to make much of a guess... Hence, the very common suggestion on the forum to see the vet!

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  • 9 years later...

I am tired of people saying "see a vet" whenever someone is simply wondering if anyone else might have experienced the same thing with their pet (husky) as this lady (Krys) has.  Yes, I know her post is well over 10 years old.  But my point is this... have a little more compassion and present more information as opposed to simply saying "go see the vet" because people who have compassion with animals usually do not have a wallet full of cash to plunk down to have a vet look at their newly acquired (adopted) pet.  In other words, if you don't have any information to give pertaining to your own experiences or the experiences of someone you know or have heard of before regarding the problem at hand, then do us all a big favor and DO NOT REPLY WITH "GO SEE A VET" !!!   People who look on the internet here for answers don't want to hear those words.  They're not stupid.  Naturally they will go see a vet if they have to.  They're hoping not to by looking here first and asking if anyone else has experienced a similar thing with their pet.  Remember, words can be powerful.  So don't be so cavalier with your words.  Have some compassion toward the person asking for help.  Giving the order to "go see a vet" does NOT help!  

I own two huskies, one of which I've had for 11 years now.  I have spent over three thousand dollars in vet bills on them.  None of that money was spent on a single operation.  Most of it was spent just to get piece of mind with the vet telling me not to worry about it, whatever "it" was at the time I felt the need to bring my husky to the vet.  About a third my $3,000 dollars probably went toward routine checkups and annual vaccinations.  Seems like I never leave the vet without shelling out at least $300 to $500 per visit.  The cost of medications and blood tests alone are enough to scare anyone!  Just the visit itself starts at $50 to $60 dollars and typically (in my experience anyway) consists of weighing the pet, watching the vet scope the ears, listening to the heart beat and answering any questions I have... which usually lasts maybe ten or fifteen minutes.  Beyond this, anything else requires additional tests and additional money (LOTS AND LOTS OF MONEY).  And heaven help you if you happen to get a young vet with very little experience because then they will want to do all sorts of tests (which add up to all sorts of money) simply because they don't have enough experience to instantly know or recognize how to start diagnosing the cause of the problem (better known as "process of elimination" technique, at your expense of course).

One of my huskies has two beautiful bluish-white eyes.  One day I notice that the bluish-white in the left eye turned bloodshot red all around the pupil.  It looked bad, and alarmed me so much that I decided to look on the internet to see if anyone else had experienced a similar thing with the white eyes of their dog or pet husky.  But I could not find anything about it.  Nothing.  I must have searched the internet for hours, hoping someone had a similar experience.  Then I decided to "go see the vet" just to get an opinion.  The vet's opinion was going to cost me $50 dollars, but at least I'd know whether or not to worry about it.  Six tests and three hundred dollars later, I walked out not knowing any more than when I walked in.  The vet said "I've never seen anything like this before".  One of the six tests involved the vet physically tapping my husky's eye with a soft-tipped electronic hand-tool gadget device about 4 or 5 times, and it took me and one other assistant to hold my husky's head steady just to do that test, which resulted in only two words "seems alright" uttered from the vet!  That test alone was $75 dollars.  Seriously??!!  About 3 days later, the red in my husky's left eye completely cleared up naturally, without any medication necessary.  Then about two weeks after that, my husky's right eye developed the same exact red-eye all around the pupil.  This time I knew better, and decided to simply wait it out.  Sure enough, it completely cleared up in about 5 days.  These incidents happened a year ago.  My husky is 7 years old.  I've never seen this happen again either before or since.  But I've never known any other person that owned a white-eyed dog tell me they have experienced such a thing before as my husky had.  And believe me, I've asked around a lot, especially to anyone I encounter at the dog park or whenever I'm out walking my huskies at the local trails.  

Basically, all I'm saying here is, whenever someone takes the time to write asking if anyone might know about a particular problem their pet has, don't reply with "go see a vet" because all you are doing is making them feel stupid.. and none of us are stupid, don't you agree.  In fact, we're actually being smart by trying to first search for answers here on the internet BEFORE handing over our hard-earned money to some vet that probably won't know what the hell is wrong either!!!  Going to see a vet isn't always the best answer to give, so don't give it just because you don't know what else to say!   

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10 hours ago, davelee3 said:

 

Basically, all I'm saying here is, whenever someone takes the time to write asking if anyone might know about a particular problem their pet has, don't reply with "go see a vet" because all you are doing is making them feel stupid.. and none of us are stupid, don't you agree.  In fact, we're actually being smart by trying to first search for answers here on the internet BEFORE handing over our hard-earned money to some vet that probably won't know what the hell is wrong either!!!  Going to see a vet isn't always the best answer to give, so don't give it just because you don't know what else to say!   

Welcome to the forum  - although a rant is not the usual introduction !

Some of our members have up to 40 dogs to look after and have done so for many many years, some work in rescue centres,  -  some like me have only 2  -   but have had dogs for over 40 years   -  so between us we have quite a bit of experience.     However none of us are vets  -   so bearing in mind the combined experiences  if we suggest somone takes their dog to a vet - its because we truly consider that a medical assessment might be necessary.

I am sorry that you find your vets in the USA so expensive  -  a lot of us are based in the UK  and our vets are not that expensive in comparison and well within affordability for most people  -  usually a diagnostic session will cost less than  $30.     My own vet charges  £19  ($25.96)  for a 12 month check-up - full examination visit.    I know you acknowledge that the post you reacted to was 10 years old  .............................  is it possible that attitudes might have changed in those 10 years  (although we do still give the same advice today on occasions)?  or  did you check if the person recommending the vet visit was an experienced, long standing member,  or a newbie  with unknown experience levels   - also you must bear in mind the amount of information given in the original post, was it complete  or a little confused,  were pictures offered?

People can only react to the information provided.      If we do what you suggest and say nothing whatsoever - then the person making the post could consider us uncaring as no one  'bothered to even reply'.

 

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Without pics its hard to even guess at what something could be , we can guess as much as possible but we could be wrong and then if that dog suffers because we said 'oh with THINK it might be this' then we get blamed,  if you're ever worried then yes vets should be your first port of call even if it does turn out to be nothing , we aren't vets just dog owners , some with years and years of experience some new to dogs and we won't risk any dogs health on a thought 

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