Hemangiosarcoma of Oral Cavity in a Working Horse in India

Introduction
Development of an oral mass in an equine may adversely affect the animal’s work capacity and/or welfare depending on clinical progression.

Case presentation
A 6-year old stallion presented to the Brooke Hardoi unit (india) for a gingival cricket ball-sized mass between the right maxillary canine (104) and second premolar (106), which was noted by the owner to be visibly increasing in size on a daily basis. feeding induced discomfort and bleeding from the mass. the aim of this study was to identify the nature of the mass and to provide suitable resolution of the problem.

Management and outcome
With owner consent, surgical removal of the mass was performed. the surgery was performed under general anaesthesia, induced via Ketamine @2.2 mg/kg & Xylazine at1.1mg/kg iV. upon removal, the mass was sent for histopathological examination to the indian Veterinary research institute. Based on key histopathological features the mass was diagnosed as hemangiosarcoma. on re-examination four weeks post-exci- sion, recurrence of the mass was noted at the surgical site. Based on poor prognosis for the animal’s welfare and work capacity, the stallion was euthanised.

Discussion
Hemangiosarcoma is a malignant and aggressive tumour which is prone to metastasis even after aggressive surgical management in a developed country context. the time interval between finding the initial lesion and euthanasia has been reported in horses to be on average about 18 months1. in a developing country, given the speed of regrowth following excision, the challenging location for achieving wide excision margins and the limited resource context, euthanasia was selected as the most realistic animal welfare based option.