Ataxia

My 15 yr old cat went blind last week. Blood work was fine. Vet did not check for hypertension. Today she can't walk, I stand her up and she falls over in a heap. Can't seem to hold her head up! Any ideas?

kimbra said:

My 15 yr old cat went blind last week. Blood work was fine. Vet did not check for hypertension. Today she can't walk, I stand her up and she falls over in a heap. Can't seem to hold her head up! Any ideas?

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Please find another vet, and get her there ASAP. I don't want to scare you but this sounds very serious.

Agreed. Get her to a vet today. Do you have an ER vet you can go to?

How is she today?  Did you get her to a different Vet yet?  Possibly  the blindness WAS due to hypertension , and can be rectified with meds , but this new development is perplexing.  Sounds like more than mere ataxia if she is crumbling to the ground.   Not being able to hold her head up almost sounds like low potassium, but you just had her bloodwork checked last week, right? 

Keep us posted

Thank you, we took her to the vet ER. He said there was nothing he could do. She is having strokes. She does not seem to be in pain, in fact she purrs as I hold her.

Oh my, I'm so sorry to hear that. I had a cat that went through a series of those as well, but his symptoms screamed a bit more of stroke (stumbling when walking, not coordinated, couldn't jump right, etc). I would have thought low potassium going by what you had said earlier. 

kimbra said:

Thank you, we took her to the vet ER. He said there was nothing he could do. She is having strokes. She does not seem to be in pain, in fact she purrs as I hold her.

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I'm so sorry to hear this.  Multiple strokes is pretty unusual, and can be brought on by underlying conditions.  Did they check for that?  (sometimes it's brought on by hypertension.  Do they think these are Ischaemic  or Haemorrihagic strokes?  Did they say?  Normally, cats can recover quite nicely from a stroke, but of course, it really depends on the cause.

BTW, sometimes cats purr to comfort themselves .  I'm hoping your little one is purring in your arms because she is happy to be there.

Sadly Cleo got worse. She was unable to hold her head up to eat or drink. We had to make the sad decision to send her to the rainbow bridge. Thank you all for your kind input.

I am so sorry you lost Cleo. 

The greatest love we can give is to let our furbabies go when the time comes

I'm so sorry for your loss. 

Run free at the bridge Cleo

I'm so sorry to hear this! {{{hugs}}} to you