Diagnosis

[logisticslad]

Blood work has returned from the Vet and there are highly elevated levels of Creatinine and Phosphorus, which is consistent with kidney disease. It's unclear what the origin of the kidney disease might be and in truth, it probably doesn't matter because treatments are pretty similar. Prognosis is not good, but I've decided to pursue limited intervention. So I'm taking him back to the Vet today in order to learn how to give him fluids. He'll get a shot of a phosphorous chelator that should help reduce those blood levels (this is what the Vet thinks is making him not want to eat). And we'll discuss altering his diet. I've been giving him some Nutri-Cal along with the baby food and he has kept it all down, but still hasn't passed anything yet. The Vet says that it's hard to predict whether he'll simply bounce back once his fluids are normalized or whether he'll shut down. He's taken to sleeping in an exaggerated flattened posture that makes me do double takes to make sure he's still breathing. When I woke up anxious at 5:30 in the morning, I inventoried what work I could put off while I'm dealing with this and discovered that the answer was None. In a weird way, this made me feel better as did gathering up Duncan who was sprawled in the hallway and putting him to sleep in his usual spot on the bed.

Comments

[nutmegger.livejournal.com]

Watching my old cat slowly succumb to kidney disease was agonizing. I'm pulling your kitty pulls through this okay.

Sometimes being a doctor and knowing what is wrong does not make it any easier when the answer is that there is not much to be done. I know doctors hate to hear those words.