Similar with my vet - limited # of transfusions. But it didn't have
any ill effects on mine, only positive, then after a time they went
down again. Gloria
On Oct 17, 2007, at 9:06 AM, Caroline Kaufmann wrote:
The vet I was taking Monkee to wouldn't do more than 2
transfusions. We only did one. When it wore off, it wore off
bad. I realize now that Monkee was suffering much more than he let
on and I just didn't know it at the time because he was such a
toughie, with a real zest for life. I think psychologically, when
you have a very anemic cat, the blood transfusion effects can be
really hard to deal with. Monkee had lymphosarcoma at the same
time and I wonder now if that was causing him pain and difficulty
more than the anemia. In the future, I personally would only
consider multiple transfusions (ignoring the cost for the sake of
my hypothetical) maybe if anemia is the only thing a cat is
suffering from. In hindsight, I feel like we were keeping
something going that shouldn't have kept going and I think the fact
that he died in my arms before we could even get him to a vet
exactly 14 days after the transfusion, was proof of that. His body
literally was not making and red blood cells at all and he needed
that replacement blood to even function. But it's just a
replacement and the body uses it up. So psychologically, it was
really hard on me to see this cat I loved more than anything be
"normal" again for a while just because he'd been given some
replacement blood. And then to witness the effects of the
transfusion wearing off slowly...very hard to endure. I just think
doing a blood transfusion really needs to be thought through,
especially if you have a cat who's Felv and anemia is maybe the
least of his problems...like it was in Monkee's case.
-Caroline
> Date: Wed, 17 Oct 2007 06:05:48 -0700
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> To: felvtalk@felineleukemia.org
> Subject: Re: blood transfusion
>
> I do know of one cat that has had many transfusions, more than 5, I
> think it was one of Hideyo's cats, I seem to remember her posting
it on
> the anemia list I'm on. I believe it was because the epogen quit
> working or her vet thought the cat had developed aiitbodies. I will
> write her and ask to double check, this cat is alive and well though
> still with an extremely low HCT, she is doing good. The vets can't
> figure out what is causing her anemia.
>
> > Did you get the answers you needed? Speaking specifically about
> > anemic cats who are FeLV+, blood transfusions are probably
given every
> > 10 days, and probably not more than 3 times. This is only
knowledge I
> > have gleaned from what I've seen here in the past two years and
might
> > not be completely right. Some vets won't even do more than 2
> > transfusions.
> --
>
> Belinda
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