- Joined
- Jul 12, 2016
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hi friends, this is my first post to TCS and i hope for it to be the first of many. i've spent a lot of time researching feline panleukopenia/feline distemper over the past several days and have stumbled across a few threads here, and the community seems very sensitive and welcoming. i hope i'm posting in the right place.
about a week and a half ago, on the 2nd of this month, my fiance and i went out to purchase a kitten. but oh no, not just any kitten. we live in china, and we went to a big animal market where unvaccinated, dirt-cheap kittens and cats abound. i did not know they'd be completely unvaccinated, and as my chinese isn't so hot when it comes to a variety of technical terms and i figured we were just going to be keeping her indoors 24/7 anyway, and i had never before heard of panleukopenia and how contagious/prevalent it is, so i figured, no biggie, we'll just take her to the vet for a checkup and shots next weekend when my fiance has some time off and we can go together. we took her home, and as im unemployed, i was able to spend every waking moment bonding with her and monitoring her for any signs of illness. i know new kitties can take a bit of time to warm up to their surroundings, but i did note that she wasn't particularly playful for a kitten her age (vendor said she was somewhere between 2 and 3 months, didn't give us definitive info but she seems older than two months based on photos ive seen of kittens online). figured it was just a combo of personality/disinterest in the particular toys we bought/anxiety about being in a new place and tried not to think too much of it as she was still eliminating solid waste regularly and was clearly interested in eating. although, she was unwilling to eat any kibble we put out for her - i didn't feel comfortable letting her go hungry and tried microwaving and wetting her food before finally giving up and going out to get some wet stuff, which she'd eat a bit of, but she'd never finish the portions i gave her, maybe i put out too much. she was almost always sleeping but i read that's pretty normal and she otherwise seemed to be adjusting fine to life with us and seemed to be relatively healthy. after about 3 days in our apartment she became super cuddly, always wanting to sit/sleep on or near me with a preference for sleeping on my chest/shoulders. very sweet, very gentle cat. never ever temperamental in the slightest and had a very robust meow when hungry or lonely.
last thursday, the 7th, we ran out of wet food and as the store nearby that sold it was closed by the time my fiance got off work, i did some research and decided some small bits of cooked beef probably wouldn't hurt her, at least until we could get her some more canned food the next day. she gobbled up almost everything i set out for her that evening. the next day, she was puking bile everywhere, and more lethargic than usual. on top of that, she would sit at her water dish occasionally with her head hanging over it, and it seemed like she wanted to drink but forgot exactly how. she hid herself away most of the day, and that was really what had me worried as she'd become extraordinarily affectionate in the days prior and would actively seek out my company. i insisted that we take her to the vet that afternoon/evening, but again, fiance was working overtime, so we postponed the trip till the 9th (saturday) as soon as the nearby clinic opened. that morning she was even more lethargic than the night before and i was convinced that something was seriously wrong. i knew she needed to be seen right away.
the clinic told us that her white blood cell count was dangerously low (not sure how to translate it to english/american terms - the vet said 0.4, i dont know how many parts that is per what but i was later informed that a normal/healthy range is 5.5-19.5), that the prognosis was overwhelmingly poor, and they could put her on an IV and give her some medicine to help with the nausea but the sad fact was that they'd seen another kitten come in with panleukopenia and it passed away the next day. i was heartbroken. i bawled immediately and profusely and spent most of the day comforting my cat - who, by the way, is named Gingko, i suppose i should mention - while she spent hours hooked up to an IV. at this point, she wasn't totally listless, but she was clearly uncomfortable, didn't enjoy hanging out in a cage. she had a decent amount of energy but seemed a little tired. haw was peeking out some. i think that was the day she started having diarrhea, but as far as i could tell there was no blood in it yet.
next day - aka day 3 of showing major symptoms, the 10th - same deal. spent the day hooked up to the IV, was given some anti-nausea meds. was no longer puking, still had diarrhea, the vets were practically force-feeding her canned food and just leaving the can out on the cage, feeding her from the same one multiple times per day (I now know that they were prob not the best place to take her, but im in a foreign country, i don't speak the language fluently, i swear i am doing the best i can) and told us to do the same at home! and bring the same can back the next day after leaving it in the fridge overnight. i did comment on this to the staff but they didn't seem bothered by it. they also informed me that she had blood in her stool and also had parasites though they were unspecific as to particularly which ones, had me pay for some more medicine, the next hospital we brought her to told us she had no parasites and my fiance in a fit of rage declared that they had lied to us to get us to spend more money - not entirely unheard of in this country, in fact quite the opposite, but i was obviously very distraught and that's such a dirty thing to do to someone the thought that it could actually happen at an animal clinic never crossed my mind. anyway. im getting ahead of myself and also somehow getting off topic. apologies. oh, and it's this day that her fever broke and she started to maintain a normal temp.
day 4, the 11th, monday, yesterday - kitten looks EXHAUSTED. in fact, the night before she was falling over herself at home and in a panic i tearfully explained to my fiance that i thought that was going to be her last night with us and that we needed to take her to the 24-hour hospital and stop prolonging her suffering unnecessarily. in fact she was so weak that i merely wrapped her in a bath towel to take her to the hospital - she wasn't unresponsive to the noisy city nightlife around us while we waited for a cab, but she was clearly entirely too tired to move a muscle. still not eating or drinking on her own, still dehydrated. but her eyes were occasionally very bright and alert, and the third eyelid wasn't always conspicuous. when we got to the hospital that night they told us that we were potentially overreacting, and that some cats do recover so it was too soon to say definitively that she was going to die. fiance suggested we leave her for a 3-day stay w round the clock treatment and as-needed infusions/IVs. "okay," said i, and we left her. she spent the 11th at the hospital mostly alone until we were able to visit her at 830 that evening, and she looked awful. couldn't clean herself, droopy ear tips, still meowed very weakly, still dealing with respiratory issues contracted the day before, breathing a little heavily + audibly (btw - she's been breathing rapidly since about day 2, and it still hasn't let up). the worst of it all was just how obviously weak she was. it was clearly an enormous struggle for her to stand up on her own. she could do it occasionally, but could never get into the position she wanted to be in on the first try. it usually took her a good 30 secs to a minute to sit herself where she wanted to be, if she could even manage it at all.
day 5 - today, the 12th, tuesday - hospital said she had neither had diarrhea or vomiting all the night before, temp is still normal. white blood cell count is also completely normal - 19.3, actually on the upper end of normal according to the vets. she's exhibited just about every symptom of panleuk a cat can exhibit from what i've read online, so i don't entirely doubt that the clinic told us the truth when they gave us her diagnosis (minus the tail biting and crying out from pressure on her abdomen, although i have been handling her very gently). i spent about three hours cuddling her today. her meow seemed slightly stronger but that could have just been wishful thinking, she's still so weak, and the hospital said it seemed like her energy was up slightly but i didn't see it myself. still had droopy ears and at one point i felt a tremor in her spine and then soon after witnessed her head trembling which lead to my head trembling because i processed that action as a sign that she was getting deathly cold and on the verge of dying. but it didn't happen again in the two hours after the first instance and i've been home for a few hours since so i figure if something was seriously wrong, i'd have gotten a call by now. also, she wasn't spending quite as much time staring off into the distance as she had the day before, but let me reiterate - her energy levels are still about the same, they're the one thing that's consistently gotten worse since this whole ordeal started. she's still hooked up to an IV, no secondary infections as far as i've heard. they haven't been feeding her unless she wants it, and so far she hasn't. she doesn't seem to be on her deathbed and that high white blood cell count has me cautiously optimistic for the first time since we first got news of her illness...but i still very much feel that things could go either way even though she's made it most of the way through day 5 and this is supposed to be an amazing sign that she's likely to recover. i just still don't see it. im scared and i don't know what to think. i have to wonder if because she's so small, it'll just take a little longer to see recovery? it's hard to tell exactly which info on websites is specifically aimed at adult cats and which is aimed at kittens sometimes.
i guess i'm posting because i'd like to hear some extra opinions on our situation. i hate to stereotype any group of people, but the reality is that there are many people in this country who will take advantage of others for profit, i mean as there are in any other country but its certainly more prevalent here and me being a foreigner, i'm especially susceptible to being taken advantage of and i'm obviously sincerely invested in this cat's health as i visit her at every opportunity and openly weep over her so im kind of a prime target to be lied to. it's entirely possible the doctors are bsing us about her white blood cell count + temp in order to keep us just hopeful enough that we'll leave her be and not ask for the money back we already spent on her hospital stay. i'd love to know what some folks who've had experience with this illness at this age think of how things have gone so far. it seems like she takes one step forward only to take another back, there have been lots of little victories but seemingly just as many (if not more) losses. i adore that little nugget and im still holding out hope for a full recovery but it's so hard to keep my spirits high when i see her so obviously uncomfortable. is the high blood count a definitive sign she'll pull through and if so, how long should it take for us to see signs that she's on the road to recovery? what ARE some good signs that she's recovering? are there any other diseases which could mimic panleuk? we've just called the hospital and they said she threw up some but is otherwise doing about the same. thoughts?
(apologies for the lengthiness of post - i know panleukopenia can sometimes be misdiagnosed and i wanted to share as much as i could in hopes that i'd paint as clear a picture as possible of what we've been going through. please let me know if this is frowned upon in the TCS community and i'll try to edit for brevity in the future.)
photos of the baby:
about a week and a half ago, on the 2nd of this month, my fiance and i went out to purchase a kitten. but oh no, not just any kitten. we live in china, and we went to a big animal market where unvaccinated, dirt-cheap kittens and cats abound. i did not know they'd be completely unvaccinated, and as my chinese isn't so hot when it comes to a variety of technical terms and i figured we were just going to be keeping her indoors 24/7 anyway, and i had never before heard of panleukopenia and how contagious/prevalent it is, so i figured, no biggie, we'll just take her to the vet for a checkup and shots next weekend when my fiance has some time off and we can go together. we took her home, and as im unemployed, i was able to spend every waking moment bonding with her and monitoring her for any signs of illness. i know new kitties can take a bit of time to warm up to their surroundings, but i did note that she wasn't particularly playful for a kitten her age (vendor said she was somewhere between 2 and 3 months, didn't give us definitive info but she seems older than two months based on photos ive seen of kittens online). figured it was just a combo of personality/disinterest in the particular toys we bought/anxiety about being in a new place and tried not to think too much of it as she was still eliminating solid waste regularly and was clearly interested in eating. although, she was unwilling to eat any kibble we put out for her - i didn't feel comfortable letting her go hungry and tried microwaving and wetting her food before finally giving up and going out to get some wet stuff, which she'd eat a bit of, but she'd never finish the portions i gave her, maybe i put out too much. she was almost always sleeping but i read that's pretty normal and she otherwise seemed to be adjusting fine to life with us and seemed to be relatively healthy. after about 3 days in our apartment she became super cuddly, always wanting to sit/sleep on or near me with a preference for sleeping on my chest/shoulders. very sweet, very gentle cat. never ever temperamental in the slightest and had a very robust meow when hungry or lonely.
last thursday, the 7th, we ran out of wet food and as the store nearby that sold it was closed by the time my fiance got off work, i did some research and decided some small bits of cooked beef probably wouldn't hurt her, at least until we could get her some more canned food the next day. she gobbled up almost everything i set out for her that evening. the next day, she was puking bile everywhere, and more lethargic than usual. on top of that, she would sit at her water dish occasionally with her head hanging over it, and it seemed like she wanted to drink but forgot exactly how. she hid herself away most of the day, and that was really what had me worried as she'd become extraordinarily affectionate in the days prior and would actively seek out my company. i insisted that we take her to the vet that afternoon/evening, but again, fiance was working overtime, so we postponed the trip till the 9th (saturday) as soon as the nearby clinic opened. that morning she was even more lethargic than the night before and i was convinced that something was seriously wrong. i knew she needed to be seen right away.
the clinic told us that her white blood cell count was dangerously low (not sure how to translate it to english/american terms - the vet said 0.4, i dont know how many parts that is per what but i was later informed that a normal/healthy range is 5.5-19.5), that the prognosis was overwhelmingly poor, and they could put her on an IV and give her some medicine to help with the nausea but the sad fact was that they'd seen another kitten come in with panleukopenia and it passed away the next day. i was heartbroken. i bawled immediately and profusely and spent most of the day comforting my cat - who, by the way, is named Gingko, i suppose i should mention - while she spent hours hooked up to an IV. at this point, she wasn't totally listless, but she was clearly uncomfortable, didn't enjoy hanging out in a cage. she had a decent amount of energy but seemed a little tired. haw was peeking out some. i think that was the day she started having diarrhea, but as far as i could tell there was no blood in it yet.
next day - aka day 3 of showing major symptoms, the 10th - same deal. spent the day hooked up to the IV, was given some anti-nausea meds. was no longer puking, still had diarrhea, the vets were practically force-feeding her canned food and just leaving the can out on the cage, feeding her from the same one multiple times per day (I now know that they were prob not the best place to take her, but im in a foreign country, i don't speak the language fluently, i swear i am doing the best i can) and told us to do the same at home! and bring the same can back the next day after leaving it in the fridge overnight. i did comment on this to the staff but they didn't seem bothered by it. they also informed me that she had blood in her stool and also had parasites though they were unspecific as to particularly which ones, had me pay for some more medicine, the next hospital we brought her to told us she had no parasites and my fiance in a fit of rage declared that they had lied to us to get us to spend more money - not entirely unheard of in this country, in fact quite the opposite, but i was obviously very distraught and that's such a dirty thing to do to someone the thought that it could actually happen at an animal clinic never crossed my mind. anyway. im getting ahead of myself and also somehow getting off topic. apologies. oh, and it's this day that her fever broke and she started to maintain a normal temp.
day 4, the 11th, monday, yesterday - kitten looks EXHAUSTED. in fact, the night before she was falling over herself at home and in a panic i tearfully explained to my fiance that i thought that was going to be her last night with us and that we needed to take her to the 24-hour hospital and stop prolonging her suffering unnecessarily. in fact she was so weak that i merely wrapped her in a bath towel to take her to the hospital - she wasn't unresponsive to the noisy city nightlife around us while we waited for a cab, but she was clearly entirely too tired to move a muscle. still not eating or drinking on her own, still dehydrated. but her eyes were occasionally very bright and alert, and the third eyelid wasn't always conspicuous. when we got to the hospital that night they told us that we were potentially overreacting, and that some cats do recover so it was too soon to say definitively that she was going to die. fiance suggested we leave her for a 3-day stay w round the clock treatment and as-needed infusions/IVs. "okay," said i, and we left her. she spent the 11th at the hospital mostly alone until we were able to visit her at 830 that evening, and she looked awful. couldn't clean herself, droopy ear tips, still meowed very weakly, still dealing with respiratory issues contracted the day before, breathing a little heavily + audibly (btw - she's been breathing rapidly since about day 2, and it still hasn't let up). the worst of it all was just how obviously weak she was. it was clearly an enormous struggle for her to stand up on her own. she could do it occasionally, but could never get into the position she wanted to be in on the first try. it usually took her a good 30 secs to a minute to sit herself where she wanted to be, if she could even manage it at all.
day 5 - today, the 12th, tuesday - hospital said she had neither had diarrhea or vomiting all the night before, temp is still normal. white blood cell count is also completely normal - 19.3, actually on the upper end of normal according to the vets. she's exhibited just about every symptom of panleuk a cat can exhibit from what i've read online, so i don't entirely doubt that the clinic told us the truth when they gave us her diagnosis (minus the tail biting and crying out from pressure on her abdomen, although i have been handling her very gently). i spent about three hours cuddling her today. her meow seemed slightly stronger but that could have just been wishful thinking, she's still so weak, and the hospital said it seemed like her energy was up slightly but i didn't see it myself. still had droopy ears and at one point i felt a tremor in her spine and then soon after witnessed her head trembling which lead to my head trembling because i processed that action as a sign that she was getting deathly cold and on the verge of dying. but it didn't happen again in the two hours after the first instance and i've been home for a few hours since so i figure if something was seriously wrong, i'd have gotten a call by now. also, she wasn't spending quite as much time staring off into the distance as she had the day before, but let me reiterate - her energy levels are still about the same, they're the one thing that's consistently gotten worse since this whole ordeal started. she's still hooked up to an IV, no secondary infections as far as i've heard. they haven't been feeding her unless she wants it, and so far she hasn't. she doesn't seem to be on her deathbed and that high white blood cell count has me cautiously optimistic for the first time since we first got news of her illness...but i still very much feel that things could go either way even though she's made it most of the way through day 5 and this is supposed to be an amazing sign that she's likely to recover. i just still don't see it. im scared and i don't know what to think. i have to wonder if because she's so small, it'll just take a little longer to see recovery? it's hard to tell exactly which info on websites is specifically aimed at adult cats and which is aimed at kittens sometimes.
i guess i'm posting because i'd like to hear some extra opinions on our situation. i hate to stereotype any group of people, but the reality is that there are many people in this country who will take advantage of others for profit, i mean as there are in any other country but its certainly more prevalent here and me being a foreigner, i'm especially susceptible to being taken advantage of and i'm obviously sincerely invested in this cat's health as i visit her at every opportunity and openly weep over her so im kind of a prime target to be lied to. it's entirely possible the doctors are bsing us about her white blood cell count + temp in order to keep us just hopeful enough that we'll leave her be and not ask for the money back we already spent on her hospital stay. i'd love to know what some folks who've had experience with this illness at this age think of how things have gone so far. it seems like she takes one step forward only to take another back, there have been lots of little victories but seemingly just as many (if not more) losses. i adore that little nugget and im still holding out hope for a full recovery but it's so hard to keep my spirits high when i see her so obviously uncomfortable. is the high blood count a definitive sign she'll pull through and if so, how long should it take for us to see signs that she's on the road to recovery? what ARE some good signs that she's recovering? are there any other diseases which could mimic panleuk? we've just called the hospital and they said she threw up some but is otherwise doing about the same. thoughts?
(apologies for the lengthiness of post - i know panleukopenia can sometimes be misdiagnosed and i wanted to share as much as i could in hopes that i'd paint as clear a picture as possible of what we've been going through. please let me know if this is frowned upon in the TCS community and i'll try to edit for brevity in the future.)
photos of the baby:
