I mentioned Simcoe’s improved kidney function indicators in the last post, and they turned out to be game-changing when it came to our plans for a transplant. The transplant doctor had a talk with the hospital doctor and they feel the change in values have bumped her prognosis from “a couple of months to a year” to “multiple years” and with the risk of the transplant procedure being so high they’re not comfortable with doing it at this stage of kidney disease.
We discussed a plan moving forward with the hospital vet this morning:
We’ll continue with the renal diet she’s on, the 150ml of subcutaneously injected fluids every other day, and daily acid reducer (Famotidine) and fatty acids (Welactin). Over the weekend I finally gave her the SubQ fluids, MJ had been doing it because he was more familiar with the procedure and we thought this would just be temporary until the transplant.
We’ll be holding off on further toxoplasmosis testing at this point since she’s asymptomatic and the only risk is post-transplant.
We’re making an appointment with her primary care vet to get a full dental cleaning and have the removal of her infected tooth completed. The dental work does worry me, but it needs to be done and with the improvement in her blood work and extra precautions the risks are less than than from where we were standing a week ago.
3-4 weeks after the dental cleaning we’ll have blood work done again and evaluate.
Assuming no further symptoms, we will then do blood tests quarterly to evaluate the progression of the kidney failure. Symptoms which do develop (there are many possible) will be handled as they come.
I’m very thankful that we have such a great team of doctors, they’ve all gone beyond our expectations by doing additional research, pouring over test results as they come in and working together to draft the best plan moving forward. I’m also glad that the Feline CRF Support Group exists, I haven’t posted to it yet but I’ve been reading and it’s an amazing group of very helpful, caring folks who bring together a wealth of information and experience.
Thursday, Jan 5th, 2012 at 16:06
glad to hear that Simcoe’s prognosis is better!