Jazz: Post-vet update.

Did a urine tap and are running both a simple strip based urinalysis and one where they spin the sample that takes longer to process. The preliminary strip one turned up clean, waiting to hear about the second one. No bloodwork this time as she's elsewise acting normally and her kidney numbers were very good on the 30th.

Dr. B. asked if she urinates in small bits and bobs or if she holds it in for a big release. I think she does both--I see small amounts on the floor sometimes, other times it's a flood. I actually caught her mid pee last night and it was a substantial one, so...He said it would be more concerning if it were dribbles and drabs vs. holding it in too long, though neither is necessarily good for her.

Dr. B. felt her bladder, which was full, and said it felt flaccid considering how full it felt. Had Dr. D. verify this finding. This means something could very well be starting to be amiss with my girl's bladder. He said as cats get older, especially ones who pee a lot for whatever reason, the bladder can start to go wonky.

Dr. B. thinks she might be having trouble with her bladder contracting properly and that her urinary tract might be irritated. He gave Jazz a 7-day run of a drug called Phenoxyvenzamine to help with that. He also thinks she might be getting over hydrated with 150ml of sub-qs daily, so we are to do every other day for awhile. Says her kidney numbers from her last trip in on the 30th look just fine (all within normal range) so she should be okay with the every other day regimine.

He also gave her a shot of Convenia antibiotic in case there's any lingering bits of infection from her UTI for which we just finished a 14 day run of antibiotics. I wasn't exactly pleased with her getting more antibiotics, but I can understand why he took the precaution.

No urine culture this time 'round. Dr. B. says nothing indicates it's necessary at this point. He thinks her bladder's starting to flounder a bit, not that there's infection causing that issue. While I'm glad it's not infection, I'm sad that it could mean her bladder's starting to fail. This doesn't bode well for us all in the floor peeing department...Oh wells. We'll figure it out somehow. That's what we do for our fur kids. Figure shit out. We don't give up on them, give them away, or euthanize them for what amounts to inconvenience and a bit of frustration. We just keep on keepin' on, that's all.

My poor, sweet girl. :/ So sad to see her this way...

more news on Jazz.

Called for the secondary urinalysis results (spun sample). Very low amount of white blood cells (not enough to be concerned about), very low amount of red blood cells (probably from the needle stick used to obtain the sterile urine sample) and a small amount of bad bacteria (cocxi I think it's spelled) that should be readily be taken care of by the Convenia antibiotic shot he gave her. I didn't know, so I asked if this bacteria was the sort that is contageous--evidently urinary/bladder based bacteria are only slightly contageous and nothing to worry about as far as infecting the other two kids goes.

He reiterated a couple of things: the floor peeing is likely behavioural in nature and is definitely not related to any of the findings of the tests today. Says all we can do is wait and see if the kitty prozac helps with that. Also, that we need to cut back on her sub-qs to 150ml every other day vs. every day which should help with the volume of urine we're seeing; again stating he thinks she's likely over-hydrated which can be as problematic as being dehydrated for a CRF kitty.

All we can do is wait and see, I guess. It's going to be weird not giving her the sub-qs every night--we've been doing that every day (save for a couple of days off and when she was boarded and they took care of the sub-qs for us) for the last three years and one month. Yes, I know exactly when we started her on daily sub-qs (March 10, 2009). We started Diva on hers at home on September 18, 2011). Some things you just don't forget...

And so it goes...