Hi everyone. We are new to the forum, but wanted to post because we feel a little stuck about some contradictory advice we received, and want help deciding between the two.
Just to give a summary our cat’s situation, last summer she started having issues with weight loss, vomiting, and diarrhea. She was diagnosed with IBD or possibly small cell lymphoma. When she got a biopsy, it confirmed that it was likely SCL. After experimenting with different medications to manage her symptoms (mainly vomiting), we now have her on the following regimen:
Prednisolone 5 mg daily
Cerenia 8 mg daily
Chlorambucil 5 mg every two weeks (pulsed dosing)
Recently, our vet specialist, who has been helping us manage our cat’s SCL basically from the first diagnosis, advised that because our cat’s symptoms seem to have stabilized, it’s time to start trying to reduce her Prednisolone. She’s worried about the long term effects of her being on the steroid. We’ve tried reducing the medication levels before, most recently the cerenia, but usually she starts vomiting again. However, the vet believes that a certain amount of vomiting is reasonable, and at the very least wants us to reduce to 2.5mg/5mg alternating every other day.
We posted about this on another forum, and got very different advice. They say that the priority should be getting her into remission. They also believe that the dosage for her for prednisolone isn’t even that high, that she could go up to 1mg/lb (she is about 8.5 lbs). I’ve seen other posts that say the most common side effect of long term steroid use is diabetes, which is easily managed and should go away once the steroid is reduced again. They’ve said similar things about maintaining our cerenia usage after we tried reducing it recently, which we ended up going along with.
Our usual vet also regularly weighs in on the treatment plan, and was the one pushing for us to decrease the cerenia lately. We were still willing to try it, despite advice on the other forum that the original dosage was okay. However, we had to raise it back up again because she started to throw up. So it feels like the prednisolone situation will just be a repeat of this.
Any opinions on whose advice we should follow? How do you usually make a decision when there are differing/opposing opinions? Should we get a second opinion from another vet? We’re also wondering, if we go against the vet, does that mean in the long run we will have to look for a new vet who is less concerned about the steroid use? This topic of reducing the medication comes up every few months.
Picture of Tikka attached.
Just to give a summary our cat’s situation, last summer she started having issues with weight loss, vomiting, and diarrhea. She was diagnosed with IBD or possibly small cell lymphoma. When she got a biopsy, it confirmed that it was likely SCL. After experimenting with different medications to manage her symptoms (mainly vomiting), we now have her on the following regimen:
Prednisolone 5 mg daily
Cerenia 8 mg daily
Chlorambucil 5 mg every two weeks (pulsed dosing)
Recently, our vet specialist, who has been helping us manage our cat’s SCL basically from the first diagnosis, advised that because our cat’s symptoms seem to have stabilized, it’s time to start trying to reduce her Prednisolone. She’s worried about the long term effects of her being on the steroid. We’ve tried reducing the medication levels before, most recently the cerenia, but usually she starts vomiting again. However, the vet believes that a certain amount of vomiting is reasonable, and at the very least wants us to reduce to 2.5mg/5mg alternating every other day.
We posted about this on another forum, and got very different advice. They say that the priority should be getting her into remission. They also believe that the dosage for her for prednisolone isn’t even that high, that she could go up to 1mg/lb (she is about 8.5 lbs). I’ve seen other posts that say the most common side effect of long term steroid use is diabetes, which is easily managed and should go away once the steroid is reduced again. They’ve said similar things about maintaining our cerenia usage after we tried reducing it recently, which we ended up going along with.
Our usual vet also regularly weighs in on the treatment plan, and was the one pushing for us to decrease the cerenia lately. We were still willing to try it, despite advice on the other forum that the original dosage was okay. However, we had to raise it back up again because she started to throw up. So it feels like the prednisolone situation will just be a repeat of this.
Any opinions on whose advice we should follow? How do you usually make a decision when there are differing/opposing opinions? Should we get a second opinion from another vet? We’re also wondering, if we go against the vet, does that mean in the long run we will have to look for a new vet who is less concerned about the steroid use? This topic of reducing the medication comes up every few months.
Picture of Tikka attached.
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