? immune supressant drugs: atopica, cyclosporine

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Misterbeesmom

Member Since 2016
well I spoke too soon. newest lab results show mr b's pancreas levels are up again, already.
the liver enzymes have been up for a while now, and his BG has been all over the place. his RBC is down but still in normal range. he had that bruising but now they're thinking it was a tough draw, bad draw, whatever, plus he was dehydrated. his clotting #'s came back good. vet did a draw on leg and there was no bruising.

we're going to do that blood test for acromegaly, though its not completely accurate.

she's doing a U/S on him today. its been 6 months since last one.

he's been in hospital for 3 days. I should be able to pick him up today, depending on the u/s.

he's got so much going on that its hard to know exactly what is making him feel so poorly. maybe its everything. what the vet and I both touched on was this possibility that there is something that has gone undiagnosed, and I told her its been a big fear of mine that all this time we've been missing something. last September he was vaguely not himself, and yet when we ran tests at that time, all looked fine. two months later he went in for his teeth cleaning and his BG was in the 500's and he had pancreatitis.

ANYWAYS my big question is, has anyone here used atopica or another immune-suppressing drug on their diabetic kitty? we're thinking about doing that to see if it will give his pancreas/liver a break, if indeed it is his body attacking his body. obviously we will not be doing steroids.

thoughts?

this is so frustrating.
 
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I'm sorry, I've got no information for you as I haven't used either drug for any of our cats. I am going to follow your post though because we have a possibility of an auto-immune condition with Rosa's twin, Regan. Although she isn't diabetic, because they are litter-mates so genetically similar, I'd prefer to avoid steroid use for her too so I'm looking for alternatives to discuss with our vet.
 
I'm sorry, I've got no information for you as I haven't used either drug for any of our cats. I am going to follow your post though because we have a possibility of an auto-immune condition with Rosa's twin, Regan. Although she isn't diabetic, because they are litter-mates so genetically similar, I'd prefer to avoid steroid use for her too so I'm looking for alternatives to discuss with our vet.

For now we're holding off, but i'll put up a new post, or if we can try to remember to touch base with each other, so i can let you know. We'll be going back for a checkup in 2 wks.
 
That would be great, thank you. We're still working on diagnostics at the moment, but if it does come down to being definitely auto-immune, I'd really like to have as many options available to look at as possible before I settle for steroids for her! :)
 
Bandit was diagnosed with immune mediated myelofibrosis last year, which means his immune system attacks and destroys his own red blood cells, causing anemia. Because of its severity in the beginning, he started on both steroids (prednisolone) and immunosuppressants (cyclosporine) at the time. We were able to wean him off the steroids, but our attempt to wean him off the cyclosporine failed, so he has to be on that for the rest of his life. We have been aiming for the lowest possible dose that will maintain his red blood cell count, which currently is 25mg every other day. He's pretty much stopped taking the cyclosporine pills in his pill pockets, so I'm about to switch him to the liquid cyclosporine. Because it's a slightly higher dose, he'll be getting that every 3 days.

While he needed to be on insulin while he was on the prednisolone, the cyclosporine does not affect his blood sugar at all. We haven't had any side effects from the cyclosporine itself, except for what you'd expect with a long term suppressed immune system. He's been very healthy for the most part, but we've had a few kitty pinkeye issues, and a horrible 3-4 week period where my other cat, Orpheus, got some sort of diarrhea bug which Bandit picked up from him, then Orpheus got it back once Bandit finally was doing better, and then Bandit caught it back from Orpheus a second time. I have to be very vigilant of ANY kitty sickness in my house and make sure it gets treated immediately.
 
Bandit was diagnosed with immune mediated myelofibrosis last year, which means his immune system attacks and destroys his own red blood cells, causing anemia. Because of its severity in the beginning, he started on both steroids (prednisolone) and immunosuppressants (cyclosporine) at the time. We were able to wean him off the steroids, but our attempt to wean him off the cyclosporine failed, so he has to be on that for the rest of his life. We have been aiming for the lowest possible dose that will maintain his red blood cell count, which currently is 25mg every other day. He's pretty much stopped taking the cyclosporine pills in his pill pockets, so I'm about to switch him to the liquid cyclosporine. Because it's a slightly higher dose, he'll be getting that every 3 days.

While he needed to be on insulin while he was on the prednisolone, the cyclosporine does not affect his blood sugar at all. We haven't had any side effects from the cyclosporine itself, except for what you'd expect with a long term suppressed immune system. He's been very healthy for the most part, but we've had a few kitty pinkeye issues, and a horrible 3-4 week period where my other cat, Orpheus, got some sort of diarrhea bug which Bandit picked up from him, then Orpheus got it back once Bandit finally was doing better, and then Bandit caught it back from Orpheus a second time. I have to be very vigilant of ANY kitty sickness in my house and make sure it gets treated immediately.


Thank you for sharing your experience! Good to know.

That diarrhea back and forth bug sounded awful!
 
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