Lola, the golden retriever, was given a terminal cancer diagnosis with just a couple of months to live. An aggressive cancer of the mouth spread to her lungs at 9 years old.
Lola's family prepared to keep her comfortable and say their goodbyes to the dog that was more of a family member than a pet.
Lola on the beach this summer Allison RothNow two years later, Lola is still fighting thanks to a clinical trial at UC Davis that is credited with saving her life.
Researchers at UC Davis are working to study what worked and, as part of their trial research, are hoping to uncover how they can make more patients successful, like Lola.
"What we found was that when we did this inhaled treatment, a subset of the dogs did respond quite well, but the majority of the dogs did not. So, the subsequent trials have really attempted to see if we can improve on the number of dogs that respond or figure out which dogs will respond and why," Rebhun said.
The study was sponsored by the National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health.
Lola's owner administers IL-15 treatment that required her to inhale cancer-fighting medicine. Allison Roth"That stimulates the immune system to hopefully recognize the cancer," Rebhun said.
"The big surprise was a month or so after finishing that when we went to check the X-rays and realized everything was gone," Rebhun said. "The interesting thing with Lola is because it seemed like things were getting worse, so she actually went on to get radiation therapy. That all occurred before we saw the response."
"So what we are trying to figure out is what makes Lola different, what makes her part of that 10% that responded. If we can understand why we are seeing that response, hopefully we can either, one, predict the dogs that will respond, or two, adjust other things," Rebhun said.
For Lola's family, each trip to UC Davis' veterinary hospital for her cancer check-ups comes with a mixture of hope and anxiety.
CBS13 tagged along for one of Lola's appointments in early August.
"Really, I saw nothing. Which is amazing," said Dr. Kent, showing CBS13 Lola's new scans.
"I'm greedy now, I think the oldest golden retriever has lived to be about 20 years old, can we break the record?" she laughed.
When Lola was just a puppy, she helped Allison heal from her own life-threatening tumor, which she had to be treated for at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota.
Lola never left her side.
Lola helping Allison heal Allison RothLola's loving family is soaking up every second of extra time the life-saving care has given them.
The golden girl is shining a new light on the future of cancer care.
It's step one in one day perfecting cancer treatment and making it available to not just all animals, but humans, too.
Lola will continue to receive regular checkups every few months at UC Davis Veterinary Hospital. By now, her family knows most of the staff by name.
Learn more about the trial and its findings on the UC Davis veterinary medicine website.
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