Belinda,
I was just going to write to you for an update about Fred. I'm glad he
seems to be doing better and is accepting his subqs a little more
gracefully.
Head bumps to Fred and Inky,
Nina
Belinda wrote:
Kerry,
What are Inky's BUN and creatinine values, these are the two main
ones associated with Kidney problems"
Fred gets daily fluids now, 100MLs a day, I have to bribe him with
chicken or tuna. His creatinine went from 2.6 to 4.2 in three weeks,
his BUN actually got a little better from 46 to 44 getting no fluids,
so my vet suggested 75MLs a every other day but we talked and I asked
her if it wouldn't be better for him to get fluids everyday since he
got so much worse so quickly. She said yes but since he was NOT good
about getting them she tried to make it easy for me, but he will get
what he needs. The creatinine is the most important to determine the
loss of function.
He has been pretty good, the last couple days he has grumbled a bit but
he is getting his fluids and I think he is putting some weight back
on. I think we redo bloodwork in about a month or so, I hope his
creatinine went down a little. His anemia is OK, he was 24% last time
we checked, he had a dental right before and IV fluids so we weren't
sure how accurate it was, it was 30% before the dental, he isn't acting
anemic so I'm not too worried about that.
I just wanted to impress how important fluids are for a cat with kidney
problems, I asked my vet specifically about it because there is a
person on the CRF list that keeps saying fluids are only to hyrdate
the cat, this is NOT true and I knew my vet had told me that. Yes
they do hyrdate the cat BUT they also help the part of the kidney
that is still functioning to flush the kidneys thereby helping rid the
body of toxins and keeping the healthy functioning part of the the
kidney functioning for as long as possible. CRF is a terminal
disease process but there are things you can do to delay the inevitable
and fluids are a very big part of it. My vet told me the kidney are
made up of tubularies (sp?) and when there is a kidney problem the
tubularies start scarring and closing up with scar tissue. Fluids help
keep the healthy un-scarred tubularies open and working longer so
fluids are important. Not the most scientific explanation but
basically what my vet described as I understood it anyway. Also
getting Inky to drink as much as possible is good also. Wet food if he
will eat it is better than dry and any juice you can get him to drink
is good. I will bring food to Fred when he is in another room and try
and get him to eat a little, I even add water to the wet food.
I hope Inky starts feeling better soon. Lots of prayers and healthy
positive thoughts coming for Inky.
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