Wednesday, August 06, 2008

Chumley has Kidney Disease


He's going to be starting a special diet and vitamins (for the rest of his life) as well as another 3 weeks of antibiotics because he also has a urinary tract infection. I feel sooooo bad.

Here are 2 of the tests that stood out of the normal range:

BUN: 63 (15-34 normal range)
Creatinine: 3.2 (.08 - 2.3 normal range)

His urinalysis showed specificity levels at 1016. Mindy, does that make sense? The vet says this was cause for concern but when I look up this range on the web it doesn't seem like the right number.

We are still waiting for 2 more thyroid tests to come back too.

I'll update more later, but now I'm late for work...

20 comments:

Anonymous said...

The good news is is that kidney disease is treatable and manageable. I am relieved that you know what the diagnosis is, and hope Chumley is ok.

LRinNYC (the person who originally wrote in about diabetes insipidus)

HWHL said...

Laura,
My good friend Anne has a cat who has renal failure. Her cat was given a "death sentence" but she has taken good care of him (to the point of giving him IV's, at home, every day). She really could be a veterinary nurse.

Anyway, email me if you want - my email is on my profiel - I'll be happy to hook you and Anne up so you can "talk" about treatment for this issue... she has been there and can give you some encouragement.

btw - Yes, Mortimer was my very sweet feline boy for 13 wonderful years - I loved him and even have an OIL PAINTING of him hanging in my living room! :-)

Anne hearts Jackie said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anne hearts Jackie said...

hi Smiley - I am not sure if kidney disease and kidney failure are the same thing; my brave boy JimmyCat has acute kidney failure as HWHL said...and was diagnosed with this over two years ago! I will tell you that he was on the brink of mortal kidney failure...so I think Chumley either A) has something a little different or B) has been diagnosed early enough.

Either way...JimmyCat went on a very strick diet of k/d ..which is a prescription cat food from Hills that you can get at the vets. Cats with kidney failure cant process proteins and crude fats. So adjusting the diet helped tremendously.
The second biggest thing was administering sub-cutanoeus fluids (or SubQs..or as we call them "ouchies") EVERY day. And for a while it was TWICE a day! This involves a small needle being injected under his skin and letting fluids collect for absorbtion.
Basically, it is a manual way of getting enough fluids in him so his kidneys keep working!

And all of this is now part of our routine and JC handles it beautifully.

If it turns out Chumley has this condition...and most cats that are aging (8 years or older) probably do to some degree...please know that you can keep him perfectly happy and healthy!!

HWHL is sweet to say I could be a vet tech; I have come a long way with this because I gotta tell ya...the first week of having to do this totally FREAKED me out! JC however only grumbled at my ineptitude and patiently waited for me to become a pro.

Chumley is a brave boy and I know will pull through and become part of what I call "the brave cat club".

(deleted early post because i didnt know how to edit it)

amanda said...

Oh, poor Chumley and poor you... Hope he right soon.

Stephanie said...

I'm glad you found out what it is. Good luck with Chumley.

Gberger said...

I am so glad that you took him in, and that they can diagnose & treat this! He will feel so much better, and so will you, Tom & Wrigley. God bless you.

Suzanne said...

at least you have a reason for all the craziness. I hope he does well. Good luck to all of you....my thoughts are with the Chum boy.

Anonymous said...

I'll have to look up what normal specific gravity is for a cat. (I'm the expert at dog values right now) It is good to diagnose kidney disease early because usually a change in diet and monitoring blood/urine values will help manage it. That is why I am afraid to go along with the vet's diagnosis of Sadie as D.I. and treat with eyedrops because what if there really is an underlying kidney issue going on? I am treating with antibiotics (Orbax) as well for 20 days and then I will re-test her.

Anonymous said...

www.veterinarypartner.com is a good website for information.

Lizy said...

I'm so glad they found out what the problem is! Poor little kitty! I'm sure you feel like the worst kitty mommy in the whole world.. Don't please..

Get well soon little psycho kitty..

Karyn said...

None of this changes the fact that he's still a little pervert. He calls here at all hours of day demanding that Beverly take her clothes off and talk dirty to him. The only thing this explains is his constant requests to pee on Beverly. I've always thought he was saying that to be perverted, but now I see it's just part of his disorder.

(This was a joke to make Laura laugh. I love the Chums and hope he's okay.)

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