Michelle and Doodle
Member Since 2009
Hi everyone. Thank you all so much for all of the support you have given us in the past few weeks.
They finally released Doodle from the Hospital on Wednesday evening and I'm sorry its taken me a few days to update.
It has just been insane ...
I guess the easiest thing is to give a recap to fill anyone in who hasn't been following my posts.
But for anyone who doesn't have the time or inclination to read the recap - the short version is that:
we're home - the mass (which was cryptococcus) is out of his head -- and I'm hopeful that he will be okay.
Here's the long version:
A month ago I noticed a slight change in Doodle's purr so we took him to the vet.
The vet heard a heart murmur which she thought was odd because we had been taking him in so frequently to monitor his persistently low potassium and it seemed to have developed suddenly.
She referred us to a cardiologist, who diagnosed him with heart disease and lower airway disease. We started him on Flovent.
A few days later he started making a snorting sound - so we went back to the vet and of course he wouldn't do it when he was there. :roll:
His breathing became more labored and he was losing weight from not eating so I insisted that he needed more diagnostics and after quite a bit of hassle I finally got him an appt. to be seen my internal medicine at University of Florida.
We arrived on a Thursday (18Nov) and Doodle had bloodwork, x-rays and an abdominal ultrasound that indicated he had hepatic lipidosis and needed a feeding tube. On Friday they placed the tube and did a CT Scan that revealed a mass in his nasopharynx - the plan was to remove the mass at that time... but they felt he was not stable enough to keep him under anesthesia any longer, so they decided to have us come back on Monday.
So on Monday we took him back and he had the mass removed. It was a fungal infection called crytococcus and he will need to be on meds for that - likely for the rest of his life. He was recovering well from the surgery... when suddenly his PCV dropped from 45% to 22% and they said he needed a blood transfusion - which of course he got. We don't know the reason for his anemia - they said they found no evidence of bleeding and believed it was hemolytic. ??
That night when they called to give me an update I was informed that he had been given 3u of R insulin the night before his PCV dropped and planned to give him more in a few hours. I completely freaked since Doodle's normal dose of Lev is only 0.05u (tid) and that was a massive amount for him!
I don't know if that had anything to do with his red blood cell destruction, though my vet said it could have been a combination of that, propofol and refeeding... Thankfully they didn't kill him...
He hasn't been doing well since he's been home. He is very lethargic and weak. He's lost 2.5 lbs in the last 2 months and he has vet little muscle mass. Today we ended up back at the vet because he was having hard time standing up. His PCV was 25% but he does seem to be regenerating.
I would like to say I'm optimistic... but I think perhaps hopeful is the more appropriate word.
I'll keep everyone posted on how he's doing .
They finally released Doodle from the Hospital on Wednesday evening and I'm sorry its taken me a few days to update.
It has just been insane ...
I guess the easiest thing is to give a recap to fill anyone in who hasn't been following my posts.
But for anyone who doesn't have the time or inclination to read the recap - the short version is that:
we're home - the mass (which was cryptococcus) is out of his head -- and I'm hopeful that he will be okay.
Here's the long version:
A month ago I noticed a slight change in Doodle's purr so we took him to the vet.
The vet heard a heart murmur which she thought was odd because we had been taking him in so frequently to monitor his persistently low potassium and it seemed to have developed suddenly.
She referred us to a cardiologist, who diagnosed him with heart disease and lower airway disease. We started him on Flovent.
A few days later he started making a snorting sound - so we went back to the vet and of course he wouldn't do it when he was there. :roll:
His breathing became more labored and he was losing weight from not eating so I insisted that he needed more diagnostics and after quite a bit of hassle I finally got him an appt. to be seen my internal medicine at University of Florida.
We arrived on a Thursday (18Nov) and Doodle had bloodwork, x-rays and an abdominal ultrasound that indicated he had hepatic lipidosis and needed a feeding tube. On Friday they placed the tube and did a CT Scan that revealed a mass in his nasopharynx - the plan was to remove the mass at that time... but they felt he was not stable enough to keep him under anesthesia any longer, so they decided to have us come back on Monday.
So on Monday we took him back and he had the mass removed. It was a fungal infection called crytococcus and he will need to be on meds for that - likely for the rest of his life. He was recovering well from the surgery... when suddenly his PCV dropped from 45% to 22% and they said he needed a blood transfusion - which of course he got. We don't know the reason for his anemia - they said they found no evidence of bleeding and believed it was hemolytic. ??
That night when they called to give me an update I was informed that he had been given 3u of R insulin the night before his PCV dropped and planned to give him more in a few hours. I completely freaked since Doodle's normal dose of Lev is only 0.05u (tid) and that was a massive amount for him!
I don't know if that had anything to do with his red blood cell destruction, though my vet said it could have been a combination of that, propofol and refeeding... Thankfully they didn't kill him...
He hasn't been doing well since he's been home. He is very lethargic and weak. He's lost 2.5 lbs in the last 2 months and he has vet little muscle mass. Today we ended up back at the vet because he was having hard time standing up. His PCV was 25% but he does seem to be regenerating.
I would like to say I'm optimistic... but I think perhaps hopeful is the more appropriate word.
I'll keep everyone posted on how he's doing .
