The Importance of Early Cancer Detection in Dogs: Changing the “Friday Afternoon” Emergency

It’s Friday afternoon and you’re about to head home for the weekend. A dog is rushed in with a hemoabdomen. The owner says, “he was fine this morning”. The family makes a quick and difficult decision to head to surgery. Histopathology confirms hemangiosarcoma. Today, most cancers are detected after a dog develops clinical signs (sometimes subtle, sometimes life-threatening) and the disease is advanced. But what if there was a way to detect cancer earlier, before that dog became sick, at a time when the family has more options for treatment? That is the goal of blood-based liquid biopsy testing for earlier detection. This session will provide an overview of how “the blood test for cancer” works, how this technology is being used in clinical practices around the country, and how a simple blood draw has an opportunity to change those heartbreaking “Friday afternoon” emergencies.