Re: PLease...need HELP - long, sorry

[Jennifer Phaewryn O'Gwynn]

"He began losing weight about 2 weeks ago - gums pale as snow.  Blood work shows a hematocrit of 7 - almost not compatible with life.  He is still somewhat active - gets off the bed to go to the litterbox and sometimes to the rest of the house.  Will eat if I put food in front of him.  His vet thought we could  get a remission until the blood work came back.   He is getting raw liver, Clindamycin, 5mg pred every day, PetTinic, interferon.  I have immunoregulin and could try that.   I asked about Epogen and the way my vet explained it is that with feline leukemia, where the bone marrow is basically "dead" and not going to produce red cells, to give Epogen would be like knocking on the door when nobody is home.   We decided against blood transfusions due to the stress and the short term result.   Does anyone have any ideas?"   With a hemocrit that low, I don't think there IS any option, you MUST blood transfuse. The results are only short term IF he's not producing any red blood cells from his marrow. If he's not to that point, the transfusion might just give his body the boost it needs to "jump start" itself back up. I'd at least do it ONCE, if his recovery does turn out to be short term, THEN, consider not doing it again, and saying good bye, but you have to TRY it once to KNOW if he's that far gone! Unless your vet did a bone marrow TEST to KNOW that his FELV is that advanced, he's simply guessing, and giving you "worst case scenario" rather than TRYING anything. Phaewryn   Please adopt a cat from Little Cheetah Cat Rescue!!! http://ucat.us/adopt.html Low cost Spay&Neuter services in VT, and Emergency Financial Assistance for cat owners: http://ucat.us/VermontLowCost.html Special Needs Cat Resources: http://ucat.us/domesticcatlinks.html The Sofa Poem: http://ucat.us/sofapoem.html Find us on PETFINDER! http://petfinder.com/shelters/VT44.html ----- Original Message ----- From: Gloria Lane To: felvtalk@felineleukemia.org Sent: Monday, November 06, 2006 12:47 PM Subject: Re: PLease...need HELP - long, sorry Does anybody have any ideas?  Susan(who wrote a message today) has a critical situation with her FELV baby Valley - a beautiful flame point Siamese.  Didn't want to miss out on any suggestions, as it was a long message.  Thanks - Gloria On Nov 6, 2006, at 11:12 AM, Susan Loesch wrote: ... And now Valley - please put him on the special needs list - I need prayers or meditation or chanting or whatever you believe in -- for a remission for the feleuk crisis he is in.  He is another of my "library cats" who comes to work with me.  He was a rescue from a kill shelter about 5 years ago - he was 1 or 2 at the time.  Feleuk positive.  Looked like death warmed over but once fattened up has been so healthy that I had him retested last year to see if he'd reverted to neg.   He began losing weight about 2 weeks ago - gums pale as snow.  Blood work shows a hematocrit of 7 - almost not compatible with life.  He is still somewhat active - gets off the bed to go to the litterbox and sometimes to the rest of the house.  Will eat if I put food in front of him.  His vet thought we could  get a remission until the blood work came back.   He is getting raw liver, Clindamycin, 5mg pred every day, PetTinic, interferon.  I have immunoregulin and could try that.   I asked about Epogen and the way my vet explained it is that with feline leukemia, where the bone marrow is basically "dead" and not going to produce red cells, to give Epogen would be like knocking on the door when nobody is home.   We decided against blood transfusions due to the stress and the short term result.   Does anyone have any ideas?   I apologize for the length of this.  Thanks for reading. No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.409 / Virus Database: 268.13.28/518 - Release Date: 11/4/2006

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