Musings on a Small Life

Nicki had his regular vet visit on Monday morning, so off we went in the taxi, Nick singing the Song of his People the entire way.   Nicki later in the afternoon, with a full tummy and done for the day.   He's lost a fair bit of weight (down to 11.2 lbs from 12.3 lbs last April), so I wanted to have a urine analysis done, as well as blood work (along with the usual expression of his anal glands, his claws clipped, his mouth checked, etc.). I've been waiting for the results and finally the vet just emailed me: his thyroid is fine, chemistries are "in line" with last spring's, his Creatinine actually is a few points less this time, but there was a problem with one of the blood sample tubes for the CBC and the cells were hemolyzed (I had to look that up). The vet suggested that the lab run a urine protein/creatinine ratio (as they did last April), and then said that I could bring Nicki back next week for another blood sample, no further charge. ...

Crap, crap, crappity crap, crap, crap. The vet emailed me to let me know that Nicki's calcium level had come back slightly above normal (result was 2.8, high normal is 2.7, I don't know the unit measurement), so given there are all kinds of horrendous possible causes (including CRF and cancer), he wants Nicki to fast this time and be retested. Since tomorrow is my last vacation day, I better get it over and done with. Won't Nicki be thrilled? I'll be lucky if I can get him back in the carrier. I hadn't fasted him yesterday, so I suppose it could be related to food, but....Who knows. I'll find out soon enough. I didn't waste any time Googling, of course, because I can think of at least one CB cat who had hypercalcemia, but Googling is scary: http://catexpert.blogspot.ca/2011/12/hypercalcemia-in-cats.html I'm going to try not to think about it all too much, and hope for normal re-test results. C'mon, Nick-man, please be okay!...

I saw a doctor today for my MRI test results. Not a resident, an overseeing doctor. My own overseeing doctor was off today, so I saw another--and wish she were my own doctor all the time, she was awesome! Nothing dire. "Mild facet osteoarthritis bilaterally at L3-4 and L4-5...At L5-S1 there is mild DDD and a small left paracentral disc extrusion which mildly narrows the lateral recess and focally contracts the traversing left S1 nerve root, without frank nerve root compression....Impression: Mild spondylotic changes, with a small disc herniation at L5-S1 with a mild mass effect on the left S1 nerve root. No significant spinal stenosis or other neural impairment." Bottom line: Normal wear and tear, with a small disc hernia that likely is the cause (from pressing on the nerve root) of the foot tingling. The doctor suggested chiropractic, which surprised me, given how a lot of MDs feel about chiropractors. Physio also would be an option, but it's physio that...

Thanks so much to all of you who commented yesterday, for being the voices of reason. In my head I know much of it is dependent on the cat's personality, and how much you can push them, even with time, patience and treats. Nicki, for instance, totally freaks--and I do mean freaks --at the first whiff of Advantage, so it's not something I'm able to apply to his neck, even if he's "confined" in a carrier or a room. Poor boy goes berserk. Literally. So it might be that even after a few weeks or a month he just will have none of the Aerokat. I'll do my best, because the potential/probable side effects from long-term Prednisolone use are very much in my mind, and if he won't accept the Aerokat, I'll be out of options. On a more upbeat note, his blood work came back great! His liver values were way down--the range is 27 to 158 U/L. Last year he was at 152 and this year he is at 79. I can't figure out why the significant decline, other than t...