Rutin therapy for ideopathic chylothorax

samthecat

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Hi,
After ruling out causes such as feline virus, heart disease, cancer etc, our beloved cat has been diagnosed with ideopathic chylothorax. Its been 3 weeks now and his thorax has been drained twice and 5 days ago he was placed on rutin therapy and a low fat diet. The asthma like attacks he was having have decreased drastically from 20 a day to maybe 4 or 5. He is eating, drinking and using the litter box normally. Otherwise he just sleeps, all day and all night. The rutin and diet change seem to have made some difference but I wonder if anyone knows how long it takes or if our cat will ever be himself again. The prognosis from the vet for Sam to even live was not good. We have been giving him rutin 500 mg 3 times per day. Is that too much, or not enough? Are there side effects of rutin. It has been so frustrating, the information out there seems to be so limited and our vet has not been much help either.
Thank you
 

ldg

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for your kitty!

I don't know about samthecat, but I found those links really helpful.

samthecat, I don't know if you want to get another opinion, or if you want to seek a more holistic approach to treating this problem.
But just in case, if you want to find a vet (DVM, Dr. of Veterinary Medicine) that has also been trained in things like chinese herbs, accupuncture, nutrition, or western herbs, you can see if there's anyone in your area by searching at the American Holistic Veterinary Medical Association: http://www.ahvma.org
 

barbb

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I am so sorry to hear that your little boy has this illness :-(. As to his treatment, everything I have read points to figuring out what caused the tear and the lymphatic fluid to go into the lungs. The information I got was that a spontaneous tear should self-heal in several weeks and anything other than that would require drainings or other treatments that have their own issues (shunts for drains etc.)

Our cat Bell did not respond well to rutin and had to have her lungs drained twice in 3 days. We made the painful decision to euthanize her as she was not stabilizing and in addition, she was a cat that fought vigorously anytime she had to be taken to the vet. For anyone who has not read about this disease, just the handling of a cat with chylothorax presents its own problems as the fluid is so damaging to the tissues that wrong handling can make things markedly worse.

I have not been able to bring myself to post about Bell on the rainbow bridge yet. We are still grieving.

Chylothorax is devastating as the fluid itself abrades the lungs, creates debris, and does long term damage. I think it is a quality of life decision, as to whether your cat is mellow and tolerates the vet visits and lung drainings and is reasonably happy in between. You and your sweet boy are in my prayers.
 
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