My 3.5 year old extremely loving male had just those symptoms. He is the type
to purr while he is having blood drawn and all of a sudden one day he hissed at
me when i picked him up and would gorwl when pet. He had everything from
xrays, to blood work, to urinalysis. Finally, we found he had "polyarthritis".
It is excrutiatingly painful arthritis in every joint of their body. Their
jaw i.e. they stop eating, their spine i.e. they get upset when you pick them
up or touch them. I actually almost put him to sleep he got to the point he
couldn't even walk. Over the course of a few days we put him on a very low
dose of Torbutrol (1mg) 2 x daily, pred 5 mg 2 x daily, Baytril 2 x daily,
cosequin 2 x daily, and meloxicam 1 x daily. Within 3 hours of getting his
first dose of torb he was practically normal and purring, it was 2 am and we
sat with him for hours just glad to have our cat back. He is now on pred 5mg
every other day and cosequin 1-2x daily and is doing 100%.
The statistics are that polyarthritis affects cats between the ages of 1 and 4,
mostly but not only males. 1/3 of the cats that get it have felv, another 1/3
have some other immune depressing disease, and the last 1/3 is said to be
idiopathic. Of all the cats that get it only 1/3 have all syptoms resolved and
at some point to do not need any meds and it doesnot re-occur. The rest will
eventually relapse ddespite continued medication. We are holding or breathe on
that one.
Anyway there is a diagnostic test but involves tapping a joint and is not 100%
reliable, because my cat was textbook for the disease we did not perform the
test nad started off treating pain and inflammation. I hope thisisn't was your
girl has but when it comes to leukemia every little change could be something
big. If you have anyother questions let me know
Homer (the cat) & Kristi
