Worthing horse with giant tumour back jumping fences

Specialist academics from London had to teach vets at Arundel Equine Hospital how to administer the cancer-fighting drugs to Silvia after she developed a tumour weighting 2.5kg.

The tumour, which was dangerously close to her jugular, was initially cut out but it came back as non-cancerous tissue so they opted to treat this with chemotherapy.

Silva, six, had four courses of chemotherapt over an eight-week period.

During this period – which amounted to eight weeks in total – she was kept in isolation.

But her proud owner, Michaela Francis, of Ferring, near Worthing, said she ‘behaved so well throughout the whole ordeal’.

“She coped amazingly,” she said.

Miss Francis revealed how Silvia had just jumped clear the 1.05 at Hickstead.

She recounted Silvia’s ordeal – and told how vets at the Arundel Equine Hospital said they had “never seen anything like it”.

Miss Francis said: “We brought her in April 2012 as a five-year-old and after two months she became lame.

“We had her checked out by our vets but after two weeks box rest there was no improvement and she had to go into the vets for scans.

“Vet Suzanne Duncan found the mass on her shoulder and we had biopsies done but they all came back benign.

“The surgeon had a look at the scans and decided the mass needed operating on as soon as possible.

“We had a phone call to tell us that the mass was actually cancerous and the mass was really deep into her shoulder.

“The surgeon gave us a 25% survival rate and said the 2.5kg was a centimetre away from attaching to her jugular.

“They warned us that they had not seen anything like it before.

“I have now been given the all-clear to start riding her again.”

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