I'm sorry you're going through this unhappy experience with Oliver. First of
all, I would just like to mention that the FIV vaccine is always a bad idea.
It turns the cat positive on testing. If the cat gets lost, picked up by
someone who tests him and is not aware that FIV is NOT contagious by any way
but deep biting, usually in a fight for mating superiority, then the cat would
be killed by a vet or by Animal Control. So please don't use this vaccine. It
does nothing to protect your cat because neutering is what protects most cats
from FIV, no mating, no fighting, no biting into blood vessels.
OK. Back to Oliver. Since you didn't have him tested when you originally
offered him your home, he may have been a carrier of FeLv all these years and
your other cats, who have been living with him are still healthy so don't worry
yourself too much. One of my cats, Tiger, lived to be 14. He had been tested
twice for FeLv but tested negative. The disease sometimes hides in the bone
marrow and does not show up on the test. He did become very ill towards the
end, but it was renal failure that caused his death. Because he was showing
symptoms of anorexia and anemia, the vet tested him and he was FeLv+. However,
my vet said that if he hadn't had renal failure, he may have survived another
year with good nutrition and antibiotics. Tiger lived with 12 other cats. They
ate, drank together and used each others litter boxes. They groomed each
other and slept together. They were like one big family. None of the other
cats ever tested positive
for anything even several years after Tiger passed. The very best that you
can do now for Oliver is allow him to live whatever the rest of his life is as
he has lived the past 15 years, happily and peacefully with not a whole lot of
vet visits or stress. Whatever medication you want to try, is OK as long as
you research it. This is only my own opinion. You have to take into account
what your vet tells you also. It may or may not be FeLv that has become
active. It could be an ordinary virus or bacterial infection. Vets tend to
jump on the first thing that they are taught might be fatal. I have quite a
few FIV+ cats. Every time they get an upper resp. infection, the vet tells me
that of course, they are more prone to get infections than ordinary cats.
Which isn't true because my regular cats get the sneezes and runny noses more
often than the FIV+ cats. I have learned not to do battle with old fashioned
thinking in veterinarians.
But I do gently remind them that I have had a lot of cats in for URI who were
not positive for anything but URI. I will keep Oliver and you in my thoughts.
Just keep on loving him and try to lower your own stress level so he won't feel
something is wrong.
Spay and Neuter your cats and dogs and your weird relatives and nasty neighbors
too!
________________________________
From: Don <mosquito.d...@gmail.com>
To: felvtalk@felineleukemia.org
Sent: Saturday, September 8, 2012 8:51 PM
Subject: [Felvtalk] Need advice for our cat Oliver
Hello.
Our boy Oliver, has been doing well since his brothers passing due to
CRF last Feb but in the past year or so we have seen some signs that we
had been reading as old age (less grooming, weight loss...he just turned
15 this August). Thursday night he was acting lethargic and seemed to be warm
to
the touch. I dropped him off at our vet who suggest it might
just be a virus (most of this blood panel was good, except a low white
blood cell count, now 2% below normal HCT values since July, and a 105 F
temperature). He suggested we might test
him for leukemia and FIV as he wanted to rule it out even though Oliver
has always been an indoor cat (he used a ELISA snap test...as far as we know he
has never been tested for feLV or FIV). The bad news came
later when he called to say he was positive for both. He said the FIV
could be false if Oliver was every given an FIV vaccination (he has), but the
other was likely true (and also explained the low white count and the
fever, and now in retrospect some of the other issues). The vet thinks
he may have had this all his life and is just now experiencing the
symptoms. So now he is home and although I have read up some and don't
see much hope, I wondered if anyone can offer any advice. We have sent
the blood off to get the more sophisticated test but won't hear back
until next week.
Our vet, who is the best I have had, suggested perhaps he will last a few weeks
or
months, given that he is showing signs that his body might be losing the
battle (low white cells, anemia). I'm trying to be optimistic, but with no
treatments I know this
is probably a battle we cannot win.
Here are my questions:
1. We have 2 other cats who we think have had the feLV booster recently (they
are 14 and 16 years old and got the immunization as kittens). Are they in
danger? If they got shots as kittens would they be still safe? We have Oliver
with his own litter box and am making sure they use separate water and food
bowls. There is not grooming among them.
2. Is there anyway to know if Oliver can still fight off the virus and become
free of it? If he did have it for 14-15 years, then why does he have symptoms
now? If it was a recent exposure (we cannot think of any way he would have
gotten it) then could he still be fine?
3. He seems fine now (no fever, eating, drinking, using the litter box, etc.)
so is this a good sign that perhaps he is able to fight it off or is this just
a false hope.
4. If the other test is positive, would anyone suggest using the LTCI
treatment? I have not found good scientific info on it's effectiveness
although there appear to be no major side effects.
Thanks.
Don and Oliver
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