Another Brontesaurus update...

[wordinista]

Okay, so I called the clinic last night to see how B-bear was doing.  She pulled through the transfusion fine, and was on IV meds and fluids.  She was drinking plenty of water, but hadn't touched any of the (get this) six varieties of canned and dry food they put in her cage.  So I made plans to bring a little kibble for her this morning.

I should say now that the emergency clinic is... really nice.  The doctor who founded it basically wanted it to "feel" like a real hospital.  It has little visitation rooms and everything.  Wild.  So I went down and visited with Bronte for about an hour, holding her in my lap and petting her.  She still looked pretty rough, but she had more energy, so that was something.  (What was kind of sad was that her beautiful black coat had all these little white flakes on it -- like dry skin -- because she hasn't been grooming herself properly.)  She moved around a lot and kept wanting to jump out of my lap and explore, but she had an IV thingie on one of her front legs, so I just kept her in my lap.  Eventually she curled up and started to doze, and I just petted her.  I got most of the flakes off of her, too.  And onto myself, but whatever.

So then the vet comes in.  Now, Bronte's regular vet is Dr. Young, who was on vacation this past week.  Since then, I've talked to Dr. Godwin (don't have a very high opinion of him, nope -- he's the one who found out her PCV level was at 7%, which is fatal, and didn't recommend a transfusion ASAP), Dr. Tucker (I think it was Tucker -- he's the vet she saw Saturday morning who didn't charge me for the office visit and who urged me -- if I was going to go the transfusion route -- to do it ASAP; I liked him all right), Dr. Burchard (didn't like him very much, and I don't think I could even tell you why), and Dr. Brackett (he annoyed me because he kept using a lot of technical, clinical terms, and he spoke very quickly, and he didn't really listen to the questions I was asking, so he kept giving me answers to things I wasn't asking, which was annoying).

Dr. Brackett told me that ... well, he told me a few things.  He rattled off a list of diseases that could be causing Bronte to be this sick, and said that, yes, FeLV and FIV were possibilities and would show up with a bone marrow scan.  He also implied that whatever's making her sick could possibly have been resolved with the transfusion, and could be controlled with meds.  Of course, it's also possible that it could NOT resolve whatever's making her sick, which would necessitate the marrow scan.  So there were a lot of ifs and buts, but nothing conclusive. 

Which is starting to piss me off.

I mean... here we have a cat.  Said cat is female, spayed, two years old, and is an indoor-only pet.  Said cat should not be at risk for infectious diseases, because she doesn't go anywhere.  (Seriously: she got out once, went as far as the front porch, flicked her tail like, "Oh, I don't think so," and turned around and came right back in.) 

Said cat is anemic liek whoa.  Her anemia is nonregenerative (meaning that her body isn't replacing the red blood cells she's losing), and it's immune-mediated (which basically means her immune system is attacking itself and destroying the red blood cells, which is why the prednisone was working: it suppresses the immune system, so it doesn't continue attacking the cells).

Now.  Call me crazy, but if that information alone is enough for the feline specialist I wrote to say "Sounds like FeLV; you'll want to stabilize her with a transfusion and do a marrow aspirate," then why is it so fucking hard for any of these other doctors (excluding Dr. Young, because he hasn't been around, and he does give me straight answers when I ask him point-blank questions) to commit to any sort of diagnosis?  Instead I'm getting, "Well, it could be FeLV, or FIV, or cancer, or fucking cooties, you know, because we really can't tell you anything without running an insane amount of expensive tests, covering every possible angle.  Sorry, but unless you have a six-figure income, you really have no business trying to keep your pet healthy.  You really should know better."

I mean... I just want them to listen for five minutes.  Let me tell them what I've noticed, and what we've gone through so far.  (And next time I see Dr. Young, I'm asking for a fucking copy of those pathology reports, because I'm just that damned curious at this point.)  I don't have DVM after my name, but I've been going through this rigamarole for .... about three months now.  I want honesty.  I'd like an iota of respect.  And I'd like not to be spoken down to.  I'd also like not to have five syllable medical terms thrown at my head.  I'd like to get the feeling that the doctors I'm dealing with are actually reading her file instead of skimming it.  (Case in point -- Dr. Brackett mentioned putting her on Prednisone.  I told him she's been on Pred and when she was on that alone, she went into a decline.  He went on to say that sometimes there was a 7 day lag with the drug, and that it took time to get into her system.  Excuse me, but she's been on this shit since fucking AUGUST.  I think that about covers the "lag time.")

It's hard enough worrying about her, and worrying about whether I'm doing right by her, you know?  Now you toss into the equation the possibility that these jerks are giving me the runaround (and I am STILL trying to figure out why Dr. Godwin, when he saw that her PCV level was at 7%, didn't say, "HEY!  THAT'S FATAL!  YOU SHOULD DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT!"  Instead, he told me to keep her on the meds and take her back in a week.)

I just can't help but think that between all of the tests they've run, and piling up the results over the past three months, and looking at how Bronte's reacted to various treatments... I just can't believe that they could have all that information and still say, "Nope, we have no idea what's making her sick."

Three months we've been going through this.  The entire months of August, September, and October. And still no one knows what's wrong with her.

What.  The.  Fuck.

Comments

[smartycat.livejournal.com]

*hugs* The clinic Bronte is at currently is not your regular clinic, correct? The vets probably have such a varied and rotating case load that it's impossible for them to keep anything straight (and are probably still in their training phases, many of them). Things over the last few days were probably too urgent, but it doesn't hurt to see if you can request a particular vet that you feel good about. Or corner a vet tech to pump for info. Vet techs in my experience tend to be more like nurses in that they'll give it to you straight (to the extent of their own knowledge) and treat you like a human being. And unless Dr. Young's clinic is completely closed while he's MIA, you should be able to walk in and request copies of your records at any time (or at least that's how it always worked with my vets).

Are you going to go ahead with the bone marrow scan? Even though it's probably very painful to the poor kitty, at least you'd finally get a definite yes or no in regards to the FeLV and FIV, right?

[w0rdinista.livejournal.com]

Dr. Young actually belongs to the same clinic as Dr. Godwin and Dr. Tucker -- Dr. Godwin is, as far as I know, the "boss" of the place (I still like him the least, though). Dr. Young will be back in the office this week, and I imagine I'll be taking Bronte in to discuss whether or not a marrow scan will be the best way to go. So far, he's the only vet (aside from Dr. Tucker) who I haven't wanted to throttle so far.

[darkfrog24.livejournal.com]

And onto myself, but whatever.

Heh. I'n' it the truth.

One would imagine, though, that one needs to know how to read in order to graduate from veterinary school.

Vets are becoming like nurses and teachers...

[tatertott.livejournal.com]

We're starting to fall short of vets in this country and what ends up happening is exactly what you're experiencing at the clinics: they don't have time so they skim patient files, patients get jumbled between a group of them and what one doctor will recommend, another will decline. Same thing happened to Rugby when I took him in for his pin removal. His regular surgeon was on vacation and he, nor anyone else, communicated the case to the other doctor, who would be doing the surgery in his stead, and *I* end up getting a call by said new doctor, asking "Do you know which pin we're supposed to be removing today?" Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?!
I hope your regular vet comes back from vacation soon and can step in to help this whole process - you and Bronte do not need to feel like you're watching a circus performance right now...

[rya-kelley.livejournal.com]

Is there no other vet clinics near where you live?

[w0rdinista.livejournal.com]

There are a few, yeah -- but the ER clinic is the only one in the area, and that's the only place she could go to for the transfusion, so I kind of had to deal with the vets there (Burchard and Brackett). I really like Dr. Young, and he belongs to the same clinic as Dr. Godwin, so I figure if I can try to deal with Dr. Young as often as possible, and Dr. Godwin as little as possible, I should hold on to my sanity.

Unfortunately, the feline specialist is, like, forty minutes north of us, and Bronte has a propensity for getting carsick. :P

[rya-kelley.livejournal.com]

The icon says it all.

[smartycat.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, the feline specialist is, like, forty minutes north of us, and Bronte has a propensity for getting carsick.

Might be worth getting her some Dramamine and heading on up there. ^_^;

[emrlddragon.livejournal.com]

I'd say switch vets... but kick that Dr. Brackett in the balls first.