- Joined
- May 3, 2022
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I have a 16 year old male bengal that was eating 3x the usual amount of food and losing weight. He would go out in the yard and howl and also had noticeable twitches at the base of his tail. He also avoided close contact with me which was not his usual personality. The vet ran extensive blood work and determined he had hyperthyroidism. Two treatment options presented were a medicine rubbed onto his ears everyday to manage his condition or an expensive radioactive shot that had a greater than 90% chance of curing the disease. I ended up electing for the shot. Once the shot is administered he was required to stay at least 5 days (depending on state law) at the hospital until he was no longer radioactive. Total cost $1600. It took about six months for his blood levels to normalize and hyperthyroidism to disappear. He is cured and acting 10 years younger. I wanted to share my story with his symptoms because the vet informed me hyperthyroidism is becoming an epidemic among pet cats. I did some research and the leading opinions link the fire retardant common in most our furniture and household items as the most likely culprit. Cats seem more susceptible because of their grooming habits. Nobody knows for sure. I do know Ocean will not live forever but I didn’t want to see him waste away in a hyper manic state the last years of life. Old guys should be able to relax in the sunshine. He is back to the calm loving cat he has always been. Remember that old age is not a disease. If your cats personality has changed dramatically it might not because he is just “old & grouchy”. I hope our experience can help some of you. Thanks for reading.
Thank you for your story and the explanation of what led you to get the I-131radioactive iodine treatment. We were in a similar boat with our guy. Although not quite as old as your cat but still a senior at approx. 11-12 years old. We started out with the transdermal form of Methimazole rubbed into his ear twice a day. However, after doing the research and our vet determining he would be an excellent candidate for the I-131 we decided to save up and schedule the procedure. I'm just curious since you didn't mention it - did the facility you went to do Scintigraphy? I wanted to be sure this was done which is why we chose where we went for the I-131. I'm thrilled to hear your cat had good results. Our guy is like a new gentleman too albeit our bank account suffered, lol.
