Chf Cat Life Expectancy

[sacatlady]

Hi

My male DSH cat Snowball was diagnosed with Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy in November last year. On the sheet we were given after his two day hospitalization, it said "Severe" so we didn't have high hopes. He has however, been doing well on lasix, atenolol, plagrol and fortekor. It's been 9 months now and he's lived longer than anyone expected. He's playful and normal but has a slightly diminished appetite- ever since we went away for 5 days and had him kenneled at vet cattery about three weeks ago. He is eating now but with a slightly diminished appetite.

I just wanted to ask anyone on these forums how long post diagnosis did your cats survive? I'm trying to gauge what I can reasonably expect now that he's basically in "extra time"

We don't know what to expect and what to do. We're in such a limbo.

He's a happy cat and doesn't behave sickly in any way. Sometimes we joke about him faking being ill. Anyone here experienced this too?

 

[jcat]

I'm sorry to hear you're dealing with this dread disease.

Our last cat had HCM and survived for around three years after he was first diagnosed, at that point with no symptoms. He lived for 1 1/2 years after his first bout of CHF, although the cardiologist had given him about 6 months, and almost made his 14th birthday. A friend recently lost her 10- 12-year-old HCM cat a week after he first had CHF. It's one of those diseases where you just can't predict how much time the sufferer has left.