Dooley still challenged

[John Popp]

Went to visit Dooley around lunch time and try to get him to eat some. He was pretty stoked about eating some food and I got roughly 30ml or two tablespoons into him. He would have ate more, but that was 50% more than they gave me the green light on last night.

They are pulling labs on him again and I can see enough improvement that he would be manageable for us at home. As I haven't talked to the doctor yet, and knowing their case load there, that's a good thing. If he wasn't doing better they would have called me. His regular IM Vet will be there tomorrow, and I'll feel a lot better when she's in the mix about his care and treatment.

As always, thanks for the thoughts, prayers and hugs! Always means a ton.

 

[John Popp]

OK, just off the phone with the Dr, and he does have some internal bleeding somewhere, but they believe it's healing up. Red blood cell count increased from 21% to 23% and all the other lab numbers were within expectations. Note that they did several biopsies to get samples so we will have a much better picture moving forward. Care gets shifted to his regular IM doctor tomorrow, and I'm cautiously optimistic we will get to take him home tomorrow evening.

Additionally, I was told I could give him his regular portion of dinner this evening. That is very welcome news.

 

[Carykd7kau]

We shall keep the good thoughts and prayers going his way. ( and yours... )

 

[Patti]

It sounds like things are going in the right direction, I am keeping the prayers coming!

 

[John Popp]

Our primary IM vet is back today, we have an appointment at 5:00. He's eating pretty regularly now and is off IV fluids as of this morning. A new set of Labs are due around 2:00 this afternoon and with any luck things will continue to improve. Discussion this morning with our regular tech suggested that he will probably be staying one more day, which is absolutely fine by me.

Thanks again for the thoughts and prayers, they mean the world to us, they really do!

 

[DumaLove]

Great news!! Hope he continues on this path. Hugs and headbutts!!

 

[John Popp]

Our late afternoon visit with Dooley went great. His regular IM vet was back and reviewing his afternoon labs found them to be "unremarkable". She acknowledged the week Dooley had, that the bout with pancreatitis was a symptom of other issues with no underlying disease.

This afternoon she also spent some time reviewing the profile of Dooley's raw diet from Dr Lisa Pierson. In the past she has always been guarded about it, and put the brakes on us using it as anything more than 40% of his diet. We have the green light to use the raw diet exclusively through his recovery.

In all, we had about 45 minutes with her which was fantastic! The highlight was my sister asking the doctor about behavior modification for Dooley's chewing habits. After a long pause she simply said that would be outside the realm of an internist. We got a pretty good laugh over that one.

At the end of our visit we were greeted with an ER vet as opposed to the standard vet tech to retrieve Dooley. She walks up to Dooley scratches his head and unlike he does with everyone else, he doesn't let out the usual grumble. She said she knows Dooley from the emergency clinic closer to our home where her fiancé is a surgeon. She hangs out with us for another 15 minutes before scooping up Dooley without a towel or blanket, cone or space helmet.

As for Dooley, he will be there one more night to make sure he does well without fluids. He'll be on a 2 week lock down which will be a chore, although more than happy to deal with it. He ate about a third of what he normally eats for dinner, although they had been feeding him cooked chicken, a bit of Tuna and some beef. I guess he turned his nose up at his k/d food which was probably what led the Doc to drill down on his raw diet.

Anyway, stoked our boy gets to come home!

Thanks again, you guys are the best!

 

[Carykd7kau]

Wunnerfula wunnerfula. Seriously...That is great news. Gotta watch what he ingests. Silly boy....

 

[Rafiki]

Thank you for the update John! I think that many of us will sleep well tonight. Funny how you can become so attached to a little critter you have never met!

 

[John Popp]

Thanks Rafiki!

He's a charmer!

I also agree, there are plenty of cats here I feel I know. Laughed with their antics, shed tears with their hurt and deeply grieved with others passing. I know the joy and large part of our lives our boys are, and I assume it's the same for everyone else or they wouldn't be here.

As for sleeping well tonight, I certainly will be, as I know tomorrow I have a bunky for the next 2 weeks who's certainly going to be pretty needy. No wheel to run on, tree to climb or brother to play with. It will be easy compared to this past week.