I may have made a thread about this in the past but I was thinking about it today.

About 2/3 years ago our cat Billy started developing a hard lump on the back of his neck. Our little Siamese Sydney constantly play fights with Bill and bites his neck and we assumed it was something to do with that.

But when we took him to the vet we were devastated when they said it looked like cancer, I remember thinking we would loose Billy and it broke my heart as I couldn't imagine life without him.

The lump was removed and it was diagnosed as a Sarcoma, fortunately it didn't look as though it had spread through the fatty tissue layer on his neck (it was HUGE) and he is still with us happy and fat as ever today!

But anyway, our vet told us it was in fact due to the feline lukemia injection we had given him a few years before. Our vet actually no longer gives those injections to cats as the month we had brought Bill in he had seen something like 4 or 5 other cases

This really upset us as we felt as though we were responsible and since then we haven't had our cats vaccinated, but we are now beginning to rethink that we should get them all the flue vaccines.. just not the lukemia one.

Has anyone else experienced this?

I've attached a photo of my lovely boy

Attached Images

P1020115.jpg (49.9 KB, 18 views)

Ari just got her first shot of FeLV vaccine yesterday. I'll keep an eye on her neck from now on. Thanks for pointing it out.

The vet told me that he's been using this brand of vaccine for the last 3-4 years now and he hadn't have any single case adverse reaction so far, so let's hope it continue this way.

I'm quite glad the vaccine was made before I read this post... I don't know if I would be able to made up my mind about vaccinating or not.

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I don't mean to scare anyone, just make them aware of this.

It may have been the brand of vaccine our vet used, unfortunately I don't know the name. Apparently it is something to do with vaccine not dispersing properly from the area it is injected into.

with the Leukaemia vaccine our vet said there was one brand had issues due to not dispersing? may be same one

they always make sure the inject fairly deep and encourage active play for the first few days to disperse it well

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Indysmamma, any idea of name, ours two have their boosters due early part of next year. The vet we had them done with originally uses a combined one i think, but the one which i always used for my old cat, uses the combination one but one element is missing, not sure if its the lukemia one.

Billy - your gorgeous x

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One day i'll learn where the spellcheck is on my phone, so sorry for any mistakes

i had a talk with my vet about what jabs to get & whether combining different ones on the same day was ok etc - he said felv one has improved in safety and he was now happy giving it , but not the FIV one & would warn anyone who wanted it.

i dont know the brand they use

ask yours whether they are happy with what they have

I haven't heard of this ever before, but then, FeLV vaccination is not very common over here in Holland. But no-one was ever warned against FeLV vaccination either, and it is given to cats going to pet hotels that demand full vaccination, so I think it is indeed due to a single brand of vaccine, maybe in combination with injecting it too superficially....

But the only lumps I have ever encountered in cats were lipoma (benign fat growth), reactive lymph node (a completely natural reaction to an infection) and haemangioma (blood cyst).

Female cats, especially if they have not been neutered but given contraceptives instead, run a relatively great risk of developing breast cancer. A colleague's cat had this, but all my cats have always been neutered at 5 to 8 months, so I never had a cat with breast cancer.

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Jiskefet & the mognificent Dutch bunch

My little angels at the rainbow bridge

Sorry to hear about Billy. Yes, I've definitely heard of this-it's known as VAS or Vaccine Associated Sarcoma and is definitely as a result of the older adjuvant vaccines used for Felv. Please don't blame yourself, you were doing what you believed was right at the time. I would always vaccinate outdoor cats against this and have done so. However, the newer recombinant ones now used are much safer, thankfully though you should always check with the vet because incredibly I've heard of instances where the older one is still being used!

I'm glad to hear they managed to surgically remove all the the cancer but do please keep an eye on the site as unfortunately it can recur, so best to be vigilant.

There's actually been a report on this, and european recommendations are to have the vaccinations administered into the back leg or the ckin of the chest, the theory being that if a sarcoma does arise, it can be removed easily. In the neck, if it penetrates the muscle, it can't be removed without leaving the cat immobile, but in the chest it is cut away easily, and if given in a back leg, the leg can be amputated The vaccinations should be given in alternate legs each time. I'd recommend using Purevax for vaccinating. This is what I use on all of my kittens, and what I recommend to new owners, because it is, in my opinion, the safest one.

I'd get the cats vaccinated as soon as possible, as the risk to them is great if they aren't. You could lose them through not vaccinating just as easily, if not more so, than through vaccination.