sudden death after giving birth

In December i fostered a stray kitten and then adopted her out to my friend. It turned out that she was pregnant. Anyway, a couple of weeks ago she gave birth to 5 kittens and then suddenly on Saturday, she gave out. They rushed her to the vet and she was on a drip till late saturday night but she didn't make it. I'm still a bit hazey on the exact details...

The vet said it could have been calcium depletion because she was so very young... What could have happened? I just found out and i'm in shock. It was apparently very sudden. I was just wondering if any one else has any information on what may have happened? or has had any similar experiences...?

Is it milk fever/eclampsia?

Without a necropsy being performed you will never know. She could have retained a kitten, and that gets toxic, she could have had a disease passed to her by the male when he mated with her- it could be a number of things wrong with her. How are the kittens? It is possible they too are health compromised and will need to be watched carefully-

www.kitten-rescue.com can help with orphaned kitten care

will tell my friend to make sure she watches the kittens for any signs of .... problems. Thanks.

As hissy said, it could have been a number of things. As for the calcium depletion it is definately a possibility. Young cats that are mothers give an enormous amount of nutrients to their kittens. If the cat did not get enough food throughout her pregnancy or receive kitten food while pregnant, this is a possibility. Kittens are very hard on a cats body when the mother is still a growing kitten herself. If bloodwork was done on the cat while she was in the hosptial before she died, a calcium depletion crisis should have been evident. Calcium depletion is treatable if it's not too late. I've seen a small dog come in in a complete calcium depletion crisis and the dog was completely comatose. We treated immediately and the dog survived.
I fostered a kitten this summer that was 6 months old and pregnant. She gave birth to only 2 kittens and was fine with extra supplements, although her growth was stunted. We took xrays to find out how many kittens she was carrying. When we found out she only had 2 we decided to let her finish out her pregnancy and give birth. If she had more in there we would have had to abort her pregnancy. Many times young kittens that are pregnant either give birth to young that do not survive (because they could not physically supply enough nutrients to the fetuses) or die themselves (because they gave all their nutrients to their fetuses and had nothing left for themselves). Either way it's a sad situation with young pregnant cats. I'm so sorry to hear this happened. I hope the kittens are healthy and will be able to pull through.