So here's my dilemma. I'm struggling with a lot of decisions right now but I'll try to summarize. His hematocrit was 29 a month ago, now it's 27. Over the past 5 years, it's never been below high 30's. So something is going on that it's going down. My vet wants me to bring him back Wednesday and do an ear prick, check his HCT, and if it's ok, do a digestive panel to check for malabsorption, pancreatitis and other stuff (this is a test I've been asking about for some time, not something she is pushing). It takes 4 mls of blood. I definitely want to rule this stuff out but am hesitant to draw more blood. Part of me feels I'm so terrified of this decreasing HCT that I've sort of given up. That same part of me definitely doesn't want to accelerate that decline by drawing blood if he's really going down the path of the virus in the bone marrow, not making red blood cells, HCT steadily decreasing til he fails. On the other hand what if the anemia is mild because it's due to something like the digestive stuff and I could save him and don't try? I'm so torn. I'll hate myself if I do this bloodwork and my happy, relatively stable cat starts to crash. Thoughts? I'm going to post his whole history on the anemia group and get some opinions too and I'm trying to research the likelihood of the anemia coming from digestive issues.
Amy --- On Thu, 8/6/09, Belinda Sauro <ma...@bemikitties.com> wrote: > From: Belinda Sauro <ma...@bemikitties.com> > Subject: Re: [Felvtalk] Wolfie Update > To: felvtalk@felineleukemia.org > Date: Thursday, August 6, 2009, 10:31 PM > PS. His anemia was related to > his positive status. My vet thinks the virus activated > in his bone marrow and that is what brought on the anemia, > he developed pancreatic cancer in the 6 months we were > trying to figure out what was going on. It was obvious > something was still wrong because even after we got his HCT > normalized he was very lethargic and wouldn't eat. My > gut feeling was pancreatitis but my vet didn't think so > because his blood work was normal, I wish I had followed my > instincts and had the test for pancreatitis done, he may not > have developed cancer if we had treated him for that. > > -- > Belinda > happiness is being owned by cats ... > > http://bemikitties.com > > http://BelindaSauro.com > > > _______________________________________________ > Felvtalk mailing list > Felvtalk@felineleukemia.org > http://felineleukemia.org/mailman/listinfo/felvtalk_felineleukemia.org > _______________________________________________ Felvtalk mailing list Felvtalk@felineleukemia.org http://felineleukemia.org/mailman/listinfo/felvtalk_felineleukemia.org
