Mingus

Chris Law

Charlie Mingus was a jazz bass player and composer. Since I’m a bass player too, I named him Mingus. Mingus was the first dog that I actually went out and bought. I got him to meet girls; being a bass player just wasn’t enough. He was a really cool dog. One of eight in a litter, he was the one who sat apart from the other dogs, even when he was little. He was just one of those unusual little animals.

Mingus was a Vizsla. I knew nothing of hunting when I got him, but the dog training book said I had to go out and get a bird wing. One thing led to another, and he trained me how to hunt. By the time he was nine years old, he was a field trial champion and won first place in some giant competition. For a guy who was completely unfamiliar with this stuff, it was unbelievable to me. Field trials are very competitive and I was so proud of his accomplishment. He became a very successful hunter and field trial competitor. Most people who win these competitions have trailers full of equipment, and do it every weekend. But I just took Mingus out hunting every so often and he became a star.

One day I noticed he had a bump on his chest. He was maybe two or three years old. I had it removed and it turned out to be a low grade mast cell tumor. I really didn’t think anything at all about it. It was a benign tumor. I’m a plastic surgeon and I take off a lot of benign tumors, and they’re usually no big deal. When he had a recurrence I still didn’t think much about it.

When he was about ten years old I found a lump on his scrotum. We had it taken off and the pathology came back a grade III mast cell tumor – which is essentially a death sentence. At that time every veterinarian said my dog would surely die from this disease. They all said he had about six months to live; a few more with treatment. I was freaked out.

The Animal Cancer Center at CSU was tremendous. Their communication was just superb. The degree of professionalism and the care that I got for my dog at CSU made me more aware of how we care for patients in my own practice. As a physician, I actually learned from the Animal Cancer Center. They were very courteous and very responsive; always there to talk to me and explain things to me, even though much of it I already understood. My experience with Mingus helped to change my perspective of my human patients.

We treated Mingus with chemotherapy, and even found a way to give him a less conventional human chemotherapy, not commonly given to dogs because of the risk of liver damage. After six or seven months, we were losing control of the tumor. We decided to try radiation therapy. The tumor was so sensitive to the radiation that it wreaked havoc in his body because it died all at once. It’s called Tumor Lysis Syndrome. When the tumor is very large and it dies all at once, it releases so many toxins that it causes the patient to get very sick. We succeeded in killing the tumor - - in the process of dying, the tumor almost killed Mingus.

After two or three days in the hospital at CSU, he still looked pretty bad. So I decided to bring Mingus home for euthanasia. But just before we left CSU, I said, “You know what doc, how about we do this? I’ll call my vet at home and we’ll put Mingus down this weekend. But instead of taking him home today, how about if we leave him here for just one more day.” In football that’s called a Hail Mary pass. You know you’re going to lose the game. It’s over. But we gave him one more day.

The next day we went up to the Animal Cancer Center to pick him up he had totally perked up even though his whole hind end was so swollen that he couldn’t walk. He could get up a little bit and stand, but that was all. It was enough to give us hope and take it day by day.

We took him home and changed his dressings every two hours. We wrapped an ace bandage from his toes all the way up to his groin, a pressure bandage, to help decrease the swelling. This is no easy feat because of how the back ends of dogs are built. Essentially we were trying to put a bandage on an ice cream cone, a moving ice cream cone! The minute he got up the bandages fell down. Then we started walking him for physical therapy. At first he would limp around the kitchen and go back to his pillow. Finally, after about a month he was able to go completely around the park on his own, with no help. Amazingly enough, all of the swelling disappeared. In the month after he came home to be euthanized, he recovered from effects of the Tumor Lysis Syndrome. He went on to lead a completely normal life for another two years.

Prior to losing Mingus, I had not experienced tremendous loss. It was brutal on me because it was a battle that lasted three years. I thank God every day for the extra time I had with Mingus. If I had lost him quickly, I would have been a bitter person. But the way it happened, we had another 2 years of fantastic time together – it was a miracle. We both escaped a horrific outcome and were given extra time – great quality time. I miss him terribly but am so grateful for the 2 additional years we had together. He was one incredible dog. Oh, and the “meeting girls part worked too” - - I met my wife while walking Mingus. No joke!

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