Possible emergency with Fred

[Meowmee]

Fred today had some blood either coming out of his rear end or urethra. I’m not sure and then he vomit and he was trying to go in the litter box. The other day I noticed some blood with poop and I have been planning to get a stool sample because they catch mice And it could be a parasite, but I wasn’t sure if it was Fred or cinnamon…

neither of them are touchable and I’m wondering how I’m going to get him to the Dvm the emergency- Dvm said they will treat him and sedate him. It’s just a matter of getting him in the trap inside his room. He was still eating a little bit, but I’m going to put something in the trap and try and get cinnamon out of there. Any other ideas how to get him into the trap or the carrier without me getting injured? TIA.

 

[lisahe]

Not knowing the cats or the rooms, it's hard to say. But when we have to put our cats in carriers, one of our best methods has been to corner them with a carrier so they have no choice but to go in. (They're not feral or even large cats but they're very strong and hate to go to the vet. I've shown up at the vet's more than once with bad scratches.)

I hope you're able to get Fred into a carrier soon. The blood with poop could well be from a food issue; we had that happen with our previous cat.

Fingers crossed that you're able to get him into a carrier and to the vet soon.

 

[Meowmee]

Not knowing the cats or the rooms, it's hard to say. But when we have to put our cats in carriers, one of our best methods has been to corner them with a carrier so they have no choice but to go in. (They're not feral or even large cats but they're very strong and hate to go to the vet. I've shown up at the vet's more than once with bad scratches.)

I hope you're able to get Fred into a carrier soon. The blood with poop could well be from a food issue; we had that happen with our previous cat.

Fingers crossed that you're able to get him into a carrier and to the vet soon.

No way to even get close to them to do that so no chance of a carrier. There is no way I’m getting injured to get him to the Dvm. Sorry but I have serious health issues. These cats have not been vaccinated for a year. I believe now over their due date and it would cause a lot of issues health issues for me and other problems, so no that is not going to happen… if I can’t get him in the trap, and he is seriously ill, he’s just gonna have to die here sadly.

Right now I have him barricaded in the closet where Cinnamon was too. I put the trap open and triggered with some tuna in it, somehow Cinn managed to jump out of there, so I put some more stuff in front of where I think he jumped out. I’m just hoping he goes in there soon, because my brother has to help me get him in the car due to me having a spinal injury and I still can’t lift anything heavy.

This is what I feared most when I took these guys in, but I had hoped by now that they would trust me enough to be able to take them to the Dvm without getting injured etc. I really wish now I had just left them to live out their lives outside. I took him in when he was limping and when he healed from that, I should’ve put him back out with his buddy. They were quite happy. I had heated shelters for them and they had plenty of food and they liked being around the house outside.

 

[Meowmee]

Update, he also escaped from my barricade which was pretty lame apparently. I tried to get him in the trap behind the bed again but he just ran into the bathroom so now I have him locked in the bathroom with the trap triggered.

This trap is one that was left here by someone from a group that was supposed to be helping me trap another outdoor cat who showed up after I took cinnamon inside…it’s gotta be the worst trap ever.

I was using it because it’s quieter than my original one and I thought it would be less traumatic, but it triggers itself shut at the drop of a hat. All you have to do is pick it up and move it the wrong way, and then it shuts, which is ridiculous.

I hope he goes in there. I don’t know I have a feeling he’s going to be really stubborn about the whole thing. My Byron would never do a urine sample for me. I once had him locked in the bathroom for like over 24 hours and eventually, I just realized I have to take him to the Dvm to get it out of him there. He was indoor outdoor, also rescued from outside, and he was very stubborn about releasing any of his urine if he didn’t want to.

 

[Meowmee]

Not knowing the cats or the rooms, it's hard to say. But when we have to put our cats in carriers, one of our best methods has been to corner them with a carrier so they have no choice but to go in. (They're not feral or even large cats but they're very strong and hate to go to the vet. I've shown up at the vet's more than once with bad scratches.)

I hope you're able to get Fred into a carrier soon. The blood with poop could well be from a food issue; we had that happen with our previous cat.

Fingers crossed that you're able to get him into a carrier and to the vet soon.

Are those the two angels in your profile who scratch you? Such bad cats, meezers of course, I feel bad for you.

 

[lisahe]

Update, he also escaped from my barricade which was pretty lame apparently. I tried to get him in the trap behind the bed again but he just ran into the bathroom so now I have him locked in the bathroom with the trap triggered.

Ooh, that's an exciting development, I hope that works!

And yes, those are the two that scratch. Ireland, on the left, who looks so very angelic, has very sharp claws even for a cat. They're very, very sweet as long as we don't have to corral them to go to the vet.

I hope you're able to get Fred so he can go in for his tests.

 

[Meowmee]

Ooh, that's an exciting development, I hope that works!

And yes, those are the two that scratch. Ireland, on the left, who looks so very angelic, has very sharp claws even for a cat. They're very, very sweet as long as we don't have to corral them to go to the vet.

I hope you're able to get Fred so he can go in for his tests.

I clip all of my cat claws that I’m able to. Of course I’m not able to clip fred and cinnamon but zens scratched me the other night while he was trying to stop me from walking away. He was being playful though, and I got a big infection on my hand from it a week later… it’s still healing I had to go on an antibiotic.

 

[Meowmee]

Update 2- So Fred is still in the bathroom. He was sitting in the bathtub for quite a while, and there was more blood in the bathtub. I put some more food through the top of the cage, soft fancy feast, which he likes, and I hoped he would go in to eat it. I went to eat dinner and fell asleep for a while, woke up around 2 AM and then he was sitting on this little bench that I had set up as a little bed when I first took them in which has a towel over it, and a towel to sleep on…no sign of him going in the trap. I put a litter pan in there in case he needs it. I’m wondering if I should put some water in for him?

If it is coming from his urethra and not his rear, I’m just wondering if it’s a bad idea for him to drink if he can’t urinate?

I’m not sure what to do now. I don’t want to stress him out more or possibly get injured by going in there and trying to hurd him into the trap. He will get aggressive I’m sure because in the past if I startled him, or get too close he hisses very loudly at me. I don’t know how he would react if I went into a small room and try to get him to go in the trap.

I guess I will probably try to go back to sleep for a while and hope maybe he has gone in by later morning so I can get him to the Dvm. It will be possible maybe to get him to my regular Dvm I’m not sure… the emergency one is open 24 hours so I think you can go there all day. it would be better if I could take him to the one where I took him when I took him for the limp because they don’t charge as much for Feral Cats, and I have a feeling this is gonna be very expensive too.. but it’s almost impossible to get an appointment with them now for anything so they probably wouldn’t fit him in anyway.

So, if I get him in the trap, he’s gonna have to go to the emergency dvm which is probably the only one that will take him right away other than my regular Dvm who I haven’t been to for quite a while since before my fracture.

I hate putting him/ them through all this stress, and I wonder if I should’ve just left the trap in the room with everything as usual and hoped that he went in there to eat and just not have fed them. I could’ve ended up trapping cinnamon instead that way, but then I could’ve just put him in my studio for a while and then tried to trap Fred.

I’m wondering if I should mix some gabapentin in some more soft food and put that through the cage? Or just put it on a dish and hope he eats it because it might calm him down a little bit and make him more likely to go into the trap.

 

[lisahe]

I hope everybody made it through the night okay and that maybe you've been able to get Fred in the trap. And maybe call your vet to ask for some advice or get him in for an appointment!

 

[Meowmee]

I hope everybody made it through the night okay and that maybe you've been able to get Fred in the trap. And maybe call your vet to ask for some advice or get him in for an appointment!

Yes, we all made it through the night. Unfortunately, I have not been able to trap him. However, the good news is he is not blocked from urinating because he urinated in the litter pan I put in there. So it’s something going on with his poo. I went and put some dry food in there about an hour or two ago… I’m gonna leave him alone for a while and see if that will get him in the trap. I’m going to have take him to the emergency Dvm now because they will be the only ones that will be open if I get him tomorrow, etc. they are always open 24 hours so I can go at any time.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed that he goes in the trap soon because eventually he has to get hungry.

I didn’t get a chance to call my Dvm yet because I had to go to the doctor myself so it was a very busy day by the time I woke up again.
But I felt it was less urgent because he’s not blocked from urinating which could be a real emergency. Hopefully it’s not a real emergency but I’m assuming he would be a lot sicker by now. If it were maybe to the point that we could pick him up as long as we protected ourselves and get him in a carrier. That happened with one of my other outdoor cats- my brother just picked him up outside because he was so sick. He on the other hand was touchable… I would pet him outside and Fred is not.

thanks

 

[Meowmee]

Update 3/I just went to check after cleaning and doing a lot of stuff…Fred finally went into the trap when I put the dry food in. I don’t know how long he’s been in there. I’m just wondering- I was just planning to go to sleep. I wonder if it would be OK to leave him and catch some sleep and take him later since I have been up all night and I’ve barely had any sleep. I usually sleep around 10-2 AM and then I wake up and do stuff but this time I really just stayed up most of the time. I only dozed for a few minutes maybe.

He seems pretty calm…I was just going up to give him a dish of wet food to eat outside of the trap with some gabapentin to calm him down a bit.

 

[silent meowlook]

Hi. It’s fine to leave him in the trap while you get sleep. You could put some wet food in there with Gabapentin. Cover the trap with a towel and limit any interaction with him. Also keep the lights out. Be careful not to accidentally release him when going from the house to the car or the car to the vet. Once at the vet, make sure they know he had Gabapentin, if he does get some.

 

[lisahe]

I hope you and Fred make it to the vet today, Meowmee , and am glad to see all this good advice from S silent meowlook since I have no clue how to handle a situation like this! Fingers crossed for a good outcome.

 

[Meowmee]

Hi. It’s fine to leave him in the trap while you get sleep. You could put some wet food in there with Gabapentin. Cover the trap with a towel and limit any interaction with him. Also keep the lights out. Be careful not to accidentally release him when going from the house to the car or the car to the vet. Once at the vet, make sure they know he had Gabapentin, if he does get some.

Thank you I am at the emergency DVM now I did go to sleep for a while and they wanted to charge me like almost $2000 to do x-rays and bloodwork give him metro etc. and they want to keep him in the hospital so I said no I’m sorry I cannot afford that. So now I’m just doing x-rays and give him some sub Q fluids to come home before he comes home and metronidazole pills. They can’t seem to tell me anything. She said she couldn’t feel his bowels to see if he’s blocked because he is fat and nervous. But his bladder is OK. She thought it could be kidneys or liver disease but none of my cats with that had these symptoms of blood in the stool and straining so I opted for the x-ray in hopes that will show something.
unfortunately they don’t know how to read their own x-rays or so you have to pay for a radiologist and they could take hours. Last time with Quinn I was here for like five or six hours waiting for the radiologist. since it’s Thanksgiving, who knows how long this is going to take

On top of that I’m not feeling well. I’m on an antibiotic and I’ve got terrible runs, so it’s very hard for me to make decisions about this. I just feel like I could end up spending thousands of dollars and still have no clue what is going on so I asked him are you gonna be able to tell me if he’s dying, and even that they could not answer because I’m not going to prolong his life if this is the end for him… it will be very heartbreaking for me but there’s nothing I can do.
I’m just wondering what happened to veterinarians that almost none now can actually diagnose anything anymore or read an x-ray anymore and they charge thousands of thousands of dollars. I am very upset. I mean I wish I could give all the best possible care, but I also feel this is just a rip off.
This has happened to many of my cats at the end of their life and I do thousand thousands of dollars of stuff and they end up dying anyway and suffering.
The office is so uncomfortable and I’m sitting out in my car freezing. Because all they have a hard surfaces to sit on. I remember doing this at this place many times in fact, my beloved Tess and my beloved Sybil were both euthanized here, Tess over 20 years ago and Sybil in 2018, so I think I’m been coming here longer than any of these people have been working here.

just for xrays sub q and the exam and metro is over $800!

She told me she was able to examine him without sedating because she thinks he’s dehydrated and not feeling well. I’m wondering if that’s because he was in the bathroom overnight not eating or from whatever is going on with him. I’m just wondering if it’s just time to let him go. But I feel like I have to have some idea of what’s going on and if he can survive it.

 

[Meowmee]

So update is they said he looks constipated and they’re gonna give him an enema and then send him home and I can keep an eye on him. She said he could still have some thing like lymphoma, which is infiltrated, but there’s no obvious sign of a mass. I just hope the enemas not gonna cause more stress, but she thought it would give him some relief and then I should just give him wet food only and put the metro night is all in the wet food. I’m gonna have to keep him in the bathroom.

I ended up not giving him the gabapentin because I thought they were going to sedate him here. If I had known she was just gonna examine him. I would’ve given him that and he would’ve been easier. She said she had to put a coat on and scrub them, or something to do the x-ray, which they’re not supposed to do but she didn’t want to sedate him.

 

[silent meowlook]

I think it is best that he doesn’t stay in the hospital. He will be far too stressed. I don’t know if you know this, but I have worked at many emergency hospitals. I can tell you first hand, hospitalization for a feral cat in an emergency hospital should only be done if the cat is so critical they won’t survive otherwise. Emergency hospitals are bright and loud and filled with chaos and terrifying to a sensitive cat. Sometimes you have no choice, but this doesn’t sound like that kind of situation.

Unless you had him in the bathroom without food and water 2 days, you didn’t cause the dehydration. Not your fault.

Cats get dehydrated and then constipated. They can become dehydrated for many different reasons. Dry food being one of them.

When he gets home, just leave him be, so he can decompress from the stress of the trip.

I think if he looked critically ill to the ER, they would have at least had you sign an AMA when you left, or would have been discussing euthanasia.

I am glad you took him and hope you both feel better soon.

 

[Meowmee]

I think it is best that he doesn’t stay in the hospital. He will be far too stressed. I don’t know if you know this, but I have worked at many emergency hospitals. I can tell you first hand, hospitalization for a feral cat in an emergency hospital should only be done if the cat is so critical they won’t survive otherwise. Emergency hospitals are bright and loud and filled with chaos and terrifying to a sensitive cat. Sometimes you have no choice, but this doesn’t sound like that kind of situation.

Unless you had him in the bathroom without food and water 2 days, you didn’t cause the dehydration. Not your fault.

Cats get dehydrated and then constipated. They can become dehydrated for many different reasons. Dry food being one of them.

When he gets home, just leave him be, so he can decompress from the stress of the trip.

I think if he looked critically ill to the ER, they would have at least had you sign an AMA when you left, or would have been discussing euthanasia.

I am glad you took him and hope you both feel better soon.

thanks I do remember you mentioning that.
Well, there was no way I was gonna leave him there because I cannot afford to pay that much money and he could possibly gonna end up dying anyway, so what’s the point of it?

I agree I think it’s way too stressful for him too. I would not call him a totally feral cat, but he certainly is along with cinnamon the most scared cat I’ve ever had. He’s even more scared than cinnamon because cinnamon will come downstairs while I am there and hang out although Fred has come into to my room while I’m there and just pretends I’m not there.

He hasn’t done that for quite a while but for a long period before someone bit Merlin he had free roam of the house because I was leaving the door open when I was asleep or I was out, so, he might’ve been coming into my room because he likes to sleep under my bed. He would often run under there if I was vacuuming the other room, and I discovered him once when I went back to vacuum my room, and he ran out from under the bed.

Anyway, I’m very suspicious of these dvm in general because of past experiences. and the clincher for me was at some point towards the end I think it was before they did the x-rays. I asked them if they could clip his claws again. I had already asked them if they could do that when I called before I even brought him in and they said yes with no mention of charging for it. Well, I assumed he was going to be sedated then of course and then the woman comes back out and says to me it’s gonna cost $40 and I’m like are you kidding me? forget it. who charges $40 to clip a cat’s claws! every other Dvm I asked to do this with a cat that was not touchable did it for free.

I mentioned it because I was worried I might have to get him back to the Dvm if he’s gonna die, and I can’t get someone to come to the house, and I might have to throw a towel over him or whatever if I can’t trap him again and I don’t wanna get injured.

So she had told me at first that she was having an easier time with him and he didn't need sedation so I thought it would be easy to clip his claws. But I guess it probably would’ve just stressed him out more too. I had them clip his claws two years ago when he had the limping, and I brought him inside but he was sedated then.

I’m so exhausted and now my blood sugar has spiked up a lot.

Fred is in the bathroom now. I cleaned everything out because he did have some liquid poop, I guess from the enema. he has not touched the food with the medication which I knew was going to happen so that was more wasted money because I have no way of getting that in him. I set up his little heater on that bench that he sleeps on and he’s all curled up there, so he seems OK for now anyway, I’m just gonna let him sleep and not bother him too much. Cinnamon is sleeping on the bed he often just stays there when I come in now but eventually he runs down behind the bed. He is stressed out by not being able to be with Fred and by me trying to trap Fred etc. I think he thought I was trying to trap him as well as Fred maybe.

The dvm also did not record the history I told them accurately. I told them that he had vomited twice that I saw and there had been some bloody stool on and off over a couple of weeks and they wrote that he vomited several times and was becoming more and more lethargic where as actually, he didn’t seem lethargic at all until the last time when I saw him in the pan and he vomited, and I said it was hard to tell because he’s scared and runs away a lot. it was only at that point i knew for sure he was the one with the bloody poop etc. because I saw him.

Even after that, though, I recall that he was going to go and eat some food so the whole thing is very strange. I don’t know. I’ve had some of my cats who were eating and pooping right up until the day they died.

I don’t know if I should’ve just paid that exorbitant amount of money for the blood work, but I hope I can get it done cheaper at the other Dvm, if needed, that treats Feral Cats although they may not consider him to be feral now that he’s inside for two years. Really he should always be treated as that since he can’t be easily examined, etc.

Anyway, I’m preparing myself for another death here. Because I don’t know why he would be having blood and they haven’t given me any explanation for that. I’ve never had a cat that has bleeding from the rear end constantly like this. I just wonder if there is some obstruction in the small bowel I guess if it was cancer that would’ve showed up in the x-ray to, but they mentioned possibly doing an ultrasound if he doesn’t improve and I can’t do thousands of dollars of diagnostic tests if he’s just gonna die anyway and it’s not gonna make any difference I can’t do really expensive treatments or anything like that anymore . Very sad.

I have never been asked to sign an ADA for a cat only for people. I didn’t know they even did that. They did have me sign a paper saying I didn’t want him resuscitated because I went to sit in my car while I waited for him to get the x-ray, which was kind of odd since I was right outside the front door. I just feel like as they do with people medical records they write all the stuff about you, often lies, to try and slam you and they don’t accurately record the history.

It’s much worse with people. But I have that done to me with my cat who died from Convenia or in part from it….they wrote a bunch of lies about me in the report I needed to have her necropsy done at Cornell.
So, next time hopefully I will be feeling better myself, I’m going to type it all down and hand it to them and say I want this put in the record so it’s accurate.

I asked the receptionist to give me names of Dvm who will come to the house to euthanize, and she gave me three people’s names. She said they do this for cats who are not touchable too, so I guess I’m preparing myself for the worst here. I’ve never had a cat die at home and I’m not really sure what to expect. I don’t want them to be suffering for hours and hours.

The problem with the people who come to the house is they’re almost never available at times when everything hits the fan like 3 AM and you have to schedule an appointment etc. in advance. I’m also worried they will scare all of the cats including Fred but I don’t know what my other options are because if he’s really ill, I’m not gonna be able to trap him.

They also had me sign 2 other treatment plans that I told them I didn’t want to do…what was the point of that? I suppose so they can say I declined all of these necessary treatments- that’s what the other dvm who gave convenia was trying to do… they had a long list of treatments I had declined over a ten-year period and they tried to make it look like I never took care of my cat. Meanwhile we must’ve spent like $50,000 at the clinic over a period of 20 years, probably more than that. Every treatment was discussed with the Dvm at the time, and they agreed with me when I declined things so it was all a bunch of lies. At that time my father was so upset because I was upset. He called the Dvm and yelled at her on the phone and had her crying so, they knew what they were doing.

I don’t know how we ended up with three treatment plan estimates. The first one when she showed it to me I immediately said I can’t do that, it’s too expensive that was with the hospitalization so I told her maybe after you do the x-ray you can just give him some sub Q fluids. So she comes back about 15 minutes later and shows me one that only has sub Q fluids on it. Then I said I didn’t tell you that and she said all right I didn’t know what you meant… lol what is wrong with these people? So, they had to write it all over again without the hospitalization I guess… but I had to sign all of them saying I declined the first two.

at some point, I started saying to her that this was just outrageously expensive, and nobody can afford to do veterinary care, even basic veterinary care anymore and she says to me oh nobody can afford to go to buy food at the grocery either. I mean, what does that have to do with buying food at the grocery… them and charging way too expensive and exorbitant prices for everything?

I had already told Dvm when I talked to her I can’t afford to do thousands of dollars of tests, and then she comes back with an estimate for almost $2000. I guess I should’ve realized when she told me I think he should stay here overnight because he needs a sub Q fluids, IV and you can’t do that because you could get injured etc. that she was thinking she’s gonna get a lot of money out of me.

I do know what these hospitals are like I’ve been in many of them and you’re right some of them are very noisy and awful. At one they have all of the animals in one room. I remember visiting Sybil when she was in heart failure, there was a dog who had a brain tumor whom was constantly crying and screaming, and they weren’t even giving him a painkiller or anything, it was awful. That would be the worst situation for any cat or dog, especially one like Fred at least Sybil was in an oxygen cage then and probably could not hear it.

Maybe you are right and it is just from too much dry food, that would be the best case scenario.

 

[silent meowlook]

Don’t walk around thinking he will die, or he will. Stay positive.
The liquid poop is from the enema.

Emergency hospitals often have their techs and doctors working 12 hour shifts. A shift at the hospital is usually, you hit the ground running and don’t stop until you’re done for the night or morning. No lunches, no breaks and it is one trauma after another and usually many at once. Mostly dogs.
They come in close to death. Hit by cars, dog fights, massive injuries, seizures and allot of blood. There aren’t enough staff to run them. The staff that is there often is burnt out and have shut down any compassion they had in order to cope.
That was never me. I will say it killed me to still care. If you can imagine, dog coding on one table, vet has to be there. I am placing a pressure wrap on a dog that was hit by a car that is bleeding and wants me dead because they are so scared. I also have to place a catheter and start fluids for shock by myself. I do that and there is a 100lb pit bull in a car that had a portion of her throat ripped out by another pit. She is trying to bite her owners from the back of the car. I have to, by myself get her out of the car before she bleeds to death. The owners are hysterical. I can’t muzzle due to her wounds. Get her in and go by the parvo puppy realizing his pump is alerting. He is standing, so okay for now. While wheeling the bleeding pit in, I can hear a bunch of yelling up front. Stay focused and get the dog to treatment. Remind the vet we still have to unblock the cat and another cat that is in oxygen looks bad. I know this from a one second glance. The vet looses it and starts yelling at me because they can only do so much. The owners of the dog that just died are draped over his body crying and screaming. The owners of the Shepard who is also close to death because of an avacado pit are crying. I am still on the pit with the neck wound. An eight or so year old boy pulls at my leg and begs me not to let Sally die.( Shepard). He says she is his friend and she can’t die. His mom pulls him away. We have to euthanize the dog but can’t do it now. I turn the oxygen up for the cat and try to get the doctor to look at him but now it’s to late. 7 of the fluid pumps are beeping. This goes on for 12 hours. When I leave my shift I have trouble and try to catch up on patient care while off the clock.I am told to leave. This entire time I have kept it together. I have seen other techs lose it, the doctor lose it, the clients become belligerent and I have felt all the fear. I am driving home at 3:30 in the morning and I still hear the fluid pumps going off. I am on auto replay of the cat that died, of the little boy, of the dog that coded and died who I had told it would be okay 20 minutes prior. I can’t tell anyone what has happened. I can’t do anything at 3:30 in the morning. I go home and sit in my garage and stare at the wall. 2 hours have passed and it becoming light outside so I know I have to sleep. It takes forever to fall asleep and the next thing I know it starts all over again.

This was a massive block of text, I know. I just really need you to know what goes on at these hospitals. There is someone getting rich, yes. But it isn’t the vets or the staff. I made more in emergency than anywhere else and it was only $24 an hour. I had to stop because I couldn’t deal with people who learned not to care as self defense and people who made everything about this about them. I could always understand the clients and I loved all animals, cats especially. But not being able to provide adequate care to them, I couldn’t do.

Just trying to offer some insight here. I agree with you the ER you went to sounded all over the place with their estimates etc.

I truly wish there were feline only ER’s. It is very needed.
Try to stay positive for your guy. Is there anyway he can go back with his friend?

I get my cats Metronidazole compounded through Wedgewood Pharmacy into a liver tasting treat. Maybe you could try that.

 

[Meowmee]

Don’t walk around thinking he will die, or he will. Stay positive.
The liquid poop is from the enema.

Emergency hospitals often have their techs and doctors working 12 hour shifts. A shift at the hospital is usually, you hit the ground running and don’t stop until you’re done for the night or morning. No lunches, no breaks and it is one trauma after another and usually many at once. Mostly dogs.
They come in close to death. Hit by cars, dog fights, massive injuries, seizures and allot of blood. There aren’t enough staff to run them. The staff that is there often is burnt out and have shut down any compassion they had in order to cope.
That was never me. I will say it killed me to still care. If you can imagine, dog coding on one table, vet has to be there. I am placing a pressure wrap on a dog that was hit by a car that is bleeding and wants me dead because they are so scared. I also have to place a catheter and start fluids for shock by myself. I do that and there is a 100lb pit bull in a car that had a portion of her throat ripped out by another pit. She is trying to bite her owners from the back of the car. I have to, by myself get her out of the car before she bleeds to death. The owners are hysterical. I can’t muzzle due to her wounds. Get her in and go by the parvo puppy realizing his pump is alerting. He is standing, so okay for now. While wheeling the bleeding pit in, I can hear a bunch of yelling up front. Stay focused and get the dog to treatment. Remind the vet we still have to unblock the cat and another cat that is in oxygen looks bad. I know this from a one second glance. The vet looses it and starts yelling at me because they can only do so much. The owners of the dog that just died are draped over his body crying and screaming. The owners of the Shepard who is also close to death because of an avacado pit are crying. I am still on the pit with the neck wound. An eight or so year old boy pulls at my leg and begs me not to let Sally die.( Shepard). He says she is his friend and she can’t die. His mom pulls him away. We have to euthanize the dog but can’t do it now. I turn the oxygen up for the cat and try to get the doctor to look at him but now it’s to late. 7 of the fluid pumps are beeping. This goes on for 12 hours. When I leave my shift I have trouble and try to catch up on patient care while off the clock.I am told to leave. This entire time I have kept it together. I have seen other techs lose it, the doctor lose it, the clients become belligerent and I have felt all the fear. I am driving home at 3:30 in the morning and I still hear the fluid pumps going off. I am on auto replay of the cat that died, of the little boy, of the dog that coded and died who I had told it would be okay 20 minutes prior. I can’t tell anyone what has happened. I can’t do anything at 3:30 in the morning. I go home and sit in my garage and stare at the wall. 2 hours have passed and it becoming light outside so I know I have to sleep. It takes forever to fall asleep and the next thing I know it starts all over again.

This was a massive block of text, I know. I just really need you to know what goes on at these hospitals. There is someone getting rich, yes. But it isn’t the vets or the staff. I made more in emergency than anywhere else and it was only $24 an hour. I had to stop because I couldn’t deal with people who learned not to care as self defense and people who made everything about this about them. I could always understand the clients and I loved all animals, cats especially. But not being able to provide adequate care to them, I couldn’t do.

Just trying to offer some insight here. I agree with you the ER you went to sounded all over the place with their estimates etc.

I truly wish there were feline only ER’s. It is very needed.
Try to stay positive for your guy. Is there anyway he can go back with his friend?

I get my cats Metronidazole compounded through Wedgewood Pharmacy into a liver tasting treat. Maybe you could try that.

Thanks, I can tell you were very good at it, thank you for still caring.

I know the techs don’t make a lot of money and that’s sad because they do a lot of the work.

There was almost no one there yesterday . In fact, I was the only one there and maybe a couple of people came while I was waiting. So they were not busy. It’s actually a small location for an emergency hospital.

Unfortunately here now all the er and many of the regular dvm are like this, all about the money, this has happened to me over and over sadly and often pushing treatments when they have no clear diagnosis and which are not even needed. Like trying to give my cat a blood transfusion when she was obviously going to die because it might make her feel better for a few hours, which would cost thousands. They basically admitted that to me.

This one Fred went to was actually the cheapest one here, lol. One I took Merlin to when his stomach was bloated sent him home covered in feces and lied about it. I think you responded when I posted about that while back.

I could say some have been very good though and did a good job and really cared but they still charge exorbitant prices and are few and far between.

And they are all run by Dvm here so the Dvm who is the head or the corporation etc. is definitely making tons of money. The only really good one was my former Dvm who retired now and BOBst and Animal Medical Center.

I remember taking my cat Tess there years ago when she went into heart failure and it only cost $800, she was there about three or four days and they let us come and visit every day… they were truly very good and caring back then. now that would cost like 10,000 at least and I wouldn’t have been able to afford it.

Fred seems to be OK. But he’s not eating yet. He had one normal poop and a lot of urine from the fluid. I guess I’m not sure what to do really if I should just try giving him some dry food because that was all that he would eat to go into the trap too.

I just wonder if he has pooped out all of the stuff that was in his small intestine yet? They did not tell me if he pooped when they gave him the enema.

He gave me a big hiss when I came in to check him now and he went into the bathtub where he feels safer.

I don’t wanna let him be in the open room with cinnamon yet because I can’t monitor his poop and urine and see if he’s eating, etc. I think cinnamon is stressed out too because he’s not eating very much either compared to usual.

I have to question whether Fred is obese or not, they actually wrote that he was obese on the forms, and I do not feel he’s obese. Neither does my brother. He’s a big cat and he weighs 15 pounds but he does not look overweight.

Merlin, you can clearly see is overweight and I know that and I’ve been trying to get him to lose weight but it’s almost impossible because he screecehes at me nonstop and even when I feed him less, he never seems to lose any weight.

I don’t know what to do about the dry food if he won’t eat the wet food? I am going to call the hospital and ask them what they think.

The radiology report said there was heterogeneous material in the small intestine, but they couldn’t see anything blocking. So I wonder if it’s the dry food. The thing is he’s been eating mostly dry food for years now and he’s never had this happen before so I don’t know what suddenly caused this.

 

[lisahe]

I agree with S silent meowlook about staying positive. Feline constipation is, well, a pain in the butt but it's something that can be solved. Wet food can help. Fiber can help. Drinking water can help. One of our cats has mild constipation and has done much better since I started giving her Vet's Best Hairball Relief Digest Aid tablets. I read that other cats did well on them and tried them out on Ireland. They don't totally eliminate the problem but they help a lot. Bonus: when she's less constipated, she's less picky about her food and will eat more wet food. Maybe Fred will take her advice?

Hairball Relief Digestive Aid | Vet's Best

Prevent hairballs and support healthy digestion for the finickiest felines with Vet's Best Cat Hairball Relief Digestive Aid. They will love our classic chicken flavor recipe; you will love not having to clean up after them. Formulated by veterinarians and loved by cats.

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Further on bloody stool: sometimes changes in diet can alleviate it if the problem is caused by a food the cat has a sensitivity or allergy to. We had a cat who was diagnosed with "colitis" because she had occasional bloody stool. That went on for years and years: about 10 years, I think, if not more. She lived to be at least 15 or 16, maybe older, and did very well until her last year. (That despite us not knowing anything about feline diet at the time and feeding her mostly cheap dry food because we didn't know better.) What I'm saying (in a very roundabout way) is that catching these things early is good. And you have better tools than we did. We caught our cat's problem early but, unfortunately, this was some years ago and the vets at that clinic weren't especially experienced with cats and looking back, it seems there was generally less awareness of IBD's broad variety of symptoms and varying severity then than there is now. I feel terrible that we didn't know then what we know now about digestive disorders -- we were just plain lucky that she had mild illness for years and lived a long, active, and very cozy life. (Thank goodness we did start feeding her a can of Fancy Feast every day at some point!) She also had a horrific arrhythmia for many years: the vets warned us it could kill her in her sleep. That meant we wanted to avoid certain diagnostics for her. Anyway, I just want you to know, Meowmee , that cats can be very good at defying the odds.

S silent meowlook , thank you for that harrowing look at what goes on a vet ER. And thank you for all the great advice you give to so many of us. It means even more knowing what you've seen.