FIP, FELV and FIV oh my

My 11 month old little boy, Babys, came down with a productive hacking cough with sneezing in the last few days. He has progressively gotten worse and has been keeping his mouth open for most of the day today. We took him to the vet and he had an X-ray that showed fluid in his belly. He doesn't feel distended to me, and he is quite small. The vet also said that he is the smallest male cat he has ever seen, approximately the size of a 4-5 month old. Babys also has a fever and his breath is AWFUL. The vet is running a huge panel of bloodwork but it will take some time to come back and in the meantime he told me that he thinks it could be FIP, or possibly FELV or FIV. We have 7 cats and I feel like I've just been told that my options are that either one of my cats will die within weeks or my entire family of cats are likely immunocompromised. Am I overreacting? Can anyone else think of a possibility that isn't quite as devastating while I await this bloodwork?

Did he put Babys on antibiotics?

Watch whether it responds to the antibiotic or not.

Usually it takes 5 doses for the med to get to work on their systems, so see if the fever drops down.

If so you can rule out FIP likely, but fluid in his tummy is worrisome.

I would think not FIV, but possibly FELV if he were born with it but never tested. It can be acquired from mom if she is positive.

No, it does NOT mean that your entire clan will be sick or positive.

FIP is not contagious. While FELV is, 98% of cats who, from constant exposure to the disease that do catch it, work it out of their system and never get it.

So don't panic. 

If he is FELV positive, then get your cats tested, all who test negative then, get them an FELV injection to keep them safe, any who come back positive, you need to allow time for them to work it through, and retest in about 3 months.

Very likely will have fought it off and it's negative. Then vaccinate those cats as well.

Great chance all will be negative anyway, it's not caught nearly as easy as once suspected.

If it is FIP, well........it's deadly, no two ways about it. No cure.

Love your Babys for the time he has left and don't let him suffer.

How much does he weigh?

He did prescribe antibiotics, Orbax, once a day. Babys only weighs 4.5lbs, and he is proportionate in length making him very petite. Everything I have read described fluid in the belly as something you could feel from the outside but that doesn't seem to be the case with my kitty. He is very sick though; he's coughing/gagging constantly and obviously having difficulty breathing. I didn't read anything that talked about that being typical with FIP. Also, one of Babys litter mates died at 10 weeks- failed to thrive.

Cats with the wet form of FIP can certainly have difficulty breathing. Fluid can either collect in the lungs or in the chest cavity restricting lung function, thus causing breathing issues. My first cat with FIP had this very problem.

This is not to say your kitty has FIP; but, this disease can cause a whole host of problems, that's why it's so hard to get a definitive diagnosis.

The vet ruled out FIV and FELV today. We are still waiting on the FCoV titre. The vet told me that even if it is positive it doesn't prove that he has FIP so that's going to be very frustrating. The vet stated that, other then the issues we're experiencing, my kitty's other systems seem to be working well and his kidney and liver profiles came back normal. In the meantime, he he still does not seem distended, and the vet advised that he was not able to get a decent amount of fluid out of his abdomen to test yesterday. The vet also indicated that he has not yet ruled out toxoplasmosis. Babys is still cough/gagging, sneezing and open mouth breathing and seems to be having a tough time. He did eat a bit today. Vet said the rest of the bloodwork should be in by Thursday at the latest.

The dreaded waiting game, ugh!

Right, basically looking for a negative test, which means impossible for it to be FIP, but a positive test doesn't tell you anything really, only that kitty was exposed to the coronavirus, which basically all cats have been, at some point at least.

My vet said that a negative result isn't definitive either and he may still have FIP. Is that not correct?

If he's never been exposed to Coronavius he cannot get FIP.

This may explain it better:

Background
FeCoV is caused by a highly pathogenic feline infectious peritonitis coronavirus which has mutated from a relatively benign feline enteric coronavirus.
If the host mounts a humoral immune response against the virus, vasculitis and the effusive (wet) form of FeCoV develops.
If the host mounts a partial cell-mediated response against the virus, granulomatous inflammation may develop in many tissues.
Interpretation
Positive titers can range from 1:40 to 1:640 and indicate exposure to a strain of coronavirus.
Positive titers do not confirm the presence of FIP.
Positive serology results indicate exposure to a coronavirus (highly pathogenic or enteric) or vaccination. Positive titers can be variable in healthy, vaccinated, and FeCoV infected cats.
Approximately one-third of cats carrying a positive titer shed feline coronavirus.
A cat with a negative titer likely does not have FeCoV.

zeplinium said:

My vet said that a negative result isn't definitive either and he may still have FIP. Is that not correct?

Click to expand...

Incorrect.

FIP is a mutation of the coronavirus, so if the titer comes back neg, then impossible to have FIP.

Is his fever going down with the antibiotics?

Unfortunately, I have heard that a negative test for exposure to corona virus doesn't necessarily rule out FIP.  I hope and pray that it is not!  No kitten should ever have to go through that, ever, nor the cat parents either.

One of the main symptoms my Darcy had was a fever that didn't go down.  Her stomach wasn't distended either.

Not sure about the fever as he's only been on antibiotics since Monday. Coronavirus titer was negative. The vet said it's unlikely FIP but not impossible. His main vet was off today but will call me tomorrow to discuss where we go from here. In the meantime, Babys seems better. He's not struggling to breathe, coughing or sneezing excessively. The vet told me his creatinine was high, platelets were low, globs high and alb low. Everything else was normal except he was a bit anemic, although that was likely due to fleas. Of course we still have Issue that he's a tiny cat and the vet said his growth was stunted, and of course there's fluid in his belly. Anyone want to take bets on how much this and that there will be before we have answers?

The vet wants to run the bloodwork for toxoplasmosis now. He's still pretty congested and is also on an antihistamine that he hates now. He's pretty lethargic but will eat and isn't dehydrated. I can see his third eyelid about 1/3 of the way out every now and then.

The vet explained the FCoV test to me. Apparently, false negatives happen when the antibodies that a particular cat makes don't "fit" the test. He said it can happen about 10-20% of the time. I'm just praying that's not what we're looking at with Babys!

So the total so far:
$442 for the first exam, X-rays, bloodwork and meds
$112 for the toxoplasmosis test
$12 for the antihistamine
$32 for the trip to the walk in clinic and antibiotics for mommy's cat bite for trying to give him the nasty antihistamine!