Update on my Ninja-kitteh and Questions.... FLUTD

[moriah]

I'd posted over in the Lounge about my handsome boy Ninja and the bladder stone he had. He's out of the woods but it's still unhappy.

He's been on the feline s/d for two weeks, and is now producing more urine -- and going pretty much everywhere. We've got him confined to the bathroom but we come in and sit with him for a few hours each day and love on the boy. He's mainly confining it to the tub, which is fortunate. We hope he avoids the sink. He can't help it, and does sometimes hit the box, but he is acting like it's pain causing him to want to avoid the box.

The vet did a urinalysis and also an ultrasound of his bladder, though, and it's not all that good. He has no more obvious stones, but he's got a great deal of what she called 'sludge', and the bladder muscle is thicker than it should be, plus his bladder is larger than it should be. They're going to run a culture on the urinalysis, and they were also able to get a sample of the 'sludge' to make sure they know exactly what it's made of.

They said they think he had a urethral tear from the stone, so he's been in a lot of pain from that, and for awhile he wasn't urinating much simply because he was inflamed. That's starting to heal.

But the vet said if they can't get the sludge to dissolve with diet they may have to try to flush it all out using a catheter, and she said it is a traumatic process to do to a kitteh who is just barely healing from the obstruction/tear. I agree.

I was just wondering, if any of you have gone through this, and if the diet was good enough to get rid of the sludge.... she said a little is normal in most cats but he's got a lot of it.

Oh, and vet bills are expensive.

[Eurobabe]

1. Oh, poor Ninja..

My male tabby Sebastian has battled FLUTD (used to be called FUS) since he was about 3 years old, off and on, the poor old man. He was blocked in 1994, so badly they wanted to do a penilectomy on him, we said no thanks. I think he's had at least 2-3 attacks since then, never as severe as the first, but still very stressful for our sweet old guy.

He is now almost 17 (Nov.) his last bout nearly did him in, that was in March. He has kidney involvement now, meaning his kidneys are just getting old, and his heart muscle has thickened, so if the kidneys don't get him, likely the heart will. :cry: He's very thin now, used to weigh about 23 lbs., down to about 15 lbs. in his advanced age. I'd say the best way we've handled it is to make sure he gets filtered water (like from a Brita pitcher). He's on this nasty food that I hate, also an s/d type diet, it's liver & other disgusting stuff, but he loves it, and our aim is to make his last days as pleasant as possible for him.

How old is your Ninja? Don't give up hope, maybe with some dietary changes and even going so far as putting him on distilled water for awhile might help the sludge situation. Our vet recommended distilled water to keep the minerals in his system low.

Good luck, it is always so hard to see your furkids suffer. :hug:

And yes, vets are expensive. I've advised my daughters to get pet insurance. :yoiks: