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My dog has cancer. Can I give her aspirin or ibuprofen with prednisone?

Updated on September 23rd, 2025

Pet's info: Dog | Mixed Breed Small (up to 22lb) | Female | spayed | 12 years and 1 month old | 12 lbs

My dog has had nasal cancer for3years. We were giving her prednisone just about every day up until6months ago. We are giving it every3to5 days and feel it isn't benefiting her. We are thinking of giving her another anti inflammatory drug. Such as aspirin or ibuprofen. What do you think? Thank you

1 Answer

Most Helpful Answer

Answered By Dr. Strydom, DVM

Veterinarian

Published on April 4th, 2018

NOOOOOO!! Please don't give her aspirin or ibuprofen. That is absolutely contraindicated in a dog that is on steroids! You cannot mix steroids (prednisone) and non-steroidals (like aspirin and ibuprofen). This can cause a serious problem (namely GI ulceration that can perforate, liver failure and kidney failure).

Non-steroidals will not help at all with cancer anyway; steroids will. If anything, you should talk to your vet about increasing the prednisone dose again. Every 3-5 days is an extremely low dose and is probably not doing anything at all. She needs to be on a very high dose when you are treating cancer. Please call your vet with your concerns and get her back on a higher dose of steroids.

Hope this helps. Best wishes!

1Pet Parents found this answer helpful

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