Tiina and Hugo
Member Since 2016
Hi everyone, it's been a long time since I have written an update on my Hugo. All in all, he has been doing well until recently. I believe that last time I told about him having an echocardiogram done due to a detected heart murmur. Well it's been 8 months since that was done and I was planning on taking him to a new one as soon as the holidays were over, but last Thursday when we were at the summer cottage he started breathing really fast and was really lethargic. Finland has been dealing with expectionally hot weather for weeks and it was really hard on Hugo. He was mainly resting on the floor and looked uncomfortable, but was still his normal self and I was able to get him to eat his LC foods and control his BG. Now suddenly he refused to eat and his BG was higher than in a long time.
I was panicking and thinking where I can take him that has a 24hr vet, since it was starting to get late on a Friday evening and going towards the weekend. At this point, Hugo looked bad. He couldn't even walk anymore. Finally I found an animal hospital that was a little over an hour away and called them and was told to bring him in immediately. So off we went.
At the hospital they gave him oxygen, put him in a drip and drew blood and took a chest x-ray. It showed that he had fluid build up in his lungs, which explained the fast breathing. They started him on diuretics and told me Hugo would need to stay the night. I thought this would be the end of him, there was no way he would be able to get back on his feet. The clinic didn't have his insulin so they gave him none. I was upset about it, but I couldn't drive back and forth to bring it.
Next day they called to pick him up and told me his lungs looked slightly better now and he had eaten a little. They said it is likely he is in heart failure.
I had already booked him a new echo for Tuesday. Back at the cottage, he wouldn't eat anything and his BG was high. I tried syringe feeding, but it's hard to syringe feed and then try to control the BG. I didn't even have appropriate foods that wouldn't get stuck in the syringe. Luckily he started to eat a little on his own.
Fastforwarding to Tuesday when he had his echo. It revealed what I feared that his heart is worse. The heart muscle is unevenly thickened and his left atrium is enlarged. The aortic valve is leaky. The prognosis is not good, since he already had an episode of pulmonary edema. I was told if it came back, he would need to be euthanized. I'm heartbroken! How can things go so bad, so fast. Now he is getting two meds to control the hypertension, a diuretic and a medicine to prevent a blood clot.
I'm having a hard time getting him to eat appropriate foods. He doesn't want them and would only eat high carb foods. So now I have increased his dose to 2u. I have even had to give him dry food to coax him to eat. Maybe it doesn't matter at this point. The breathing is now better and I count his breaths twice a day. He breaths about 30 times per minute. Other than that, he is tired. I'm having a hard time accepting this, but I know I have no choice. Just to love him and help him be comfortable.
I was panicking and thinking where I can take him that has a 24hr vet, since it was starting to get late on a Friday evening and going towards the weekend. At this point, Hugo looked bad. He couldn't even walk anymore. Finally I found an animal hospital that was a little over an hour away and called them and was told to bring him in immediately. So off we went.
At the hospital they gave him oxygen, put him in a drip and drew blood and took a chest x-ray. It showed that he had fluid build up in his lungs, which explained the fast breathing. They started him on diuretics and told me Hugo would need to stay the night. I thought this would be the end of him, there was no way he would be able to get back on his feet. The clinic didn't have his insulin so they gave him none. I was upset about it, but I couldn't drive back and forth to bring it.
Next day they called to pick him up and told me his lungs looked slightly better now and he had eaten a little. They said it is likely he is in heart failure.
I had already booked him a new echo for Tuesday. Back at the cottage, he wouldn't eat anything and his BG was high. I tried syringe feeding, but it's hard to syringe feed and then try to control the BG. I didn't even have appropriate foods that wouldn't get stuck in the syringe. Luckily he started to eat a little on his own.Fastforwarding to Tuesday when he had his echo. It revealed what I feared that his heart is worse. The heart muscle is unevenly thickened and his left atrium is enlarged. The aortic valve is leaky. The prognosis is not good, since he already had an episode of pulmonary edema. I was told if it came back, he would need to be euthanized. I'm heartbroken! How can things go so bad, so fast. Now he is getting two meds to control the hypertension, a diuretic and a medicine to prevent a blood clot.
I'm having a hard time getting him to eat appropriate foods. He doesn't want them and would only eat high carb foods. So now I have increased his dose to 2u. I have even had to give him dry food to coax him to eat. Maybe it doesn't matter at this point. The breathing is now better and I count his breaths twice a day. He breaths about 30 times per minute. Other than that, he is tired. I'm having a hard time accepting this, but I know I have no choice. Just to love him and help him be comfortable.
Yes Furosemide (Furovet) and Chlopidogrel are the ones he is getting. And also amlopidin and another hypertension med. It's brand name is Nelio Vet. We didn't talk about Vetmedin though. If all goes well, I should take him back in A month for a check up. But we take it one day at a time. It's very hard for me. I guess it's true that a bond with a sugar cat is even stronger.
