Pepper and Conjunctivitis

Pepper gets random breakouts of conjunctivitis. Usually they are 3-4 months apart and always resolve with a round of terramycin. She broke with it again last night. It has only been 2 months since we had it last (june). I am sure that Misty will begin showing symptoms soon, as she usually gets it about 3 days or so after Pepper breaks out. Weird though, Claire has never had/gotten it.

I assume this is a case of herpes, however this is the only thing that she gets. There is never any cold/flu symptoms, no fever, etc. Last time we were at the vet, she was put on a course of Interferon (Misty too) but I'm not sure what that did for her.

The vet wants to run a blood test that will tell us what is causing the conjunctivitis. Normally I would jump at this to have a cause however the test alone will cost $150. If it would tell me something that was treatable/curable that would be fine, but I am afraid it will tell me it is herpes and I just have to keep doing what I'm doing. Would you run the test? It is not so much about the cost but it is the cost combined with the possible outcome of no answer...

I can always just keep getting her the terramycin but I would be treating the symptom.

What would you do?

I would have the test to rule out anything but herpes. That way you know for sure what you're dealing with.

I had my herpes-suspected kitty tested for herpes late spring. As we suspected, it came back positive. It "only" cost $75 (thought my husband was going to croak!), which I thought was a bit steep for putting snot on a q-tip, but it was worth it. Now I'm researching ways to keep her immune system stronger to avoid frequent flare-ups of the URIs.

Stephanie