Dental Prophy

[shicagah]

Alright so I had my cat in for a dental cleaning this past Friday. Elvis is going on thirteen years old. He came through the anesthesia fine.

They called me while he was out to inform me that he would need to have three teeth removed due to erosion. Fine. I figured it out and got the money together.

I had called the receptionist earlier (before I brought him in) to ask if they would be giving him antibiotics after the dental prophy and she called back and told me that, yes, they would be giving it to him should it be a severe case and he need it.

They gave him a shot of pain killers as well.

Anyway, I'm the type of person that has to sit back and absorb all the information that's being thrown at me before it sinks in.

So, four days later and it's already occurred to me that I should probably have asked about antibiotics to take home. I'm pretty sure his extraction sites are infected because he threw up seven times from the middle of the night to this morning and was off food yesterday, which I found out later when I got off work.

I've already called the vet to schedule an appointment to get him checked out and see if they're infected. Today. In an hour.

I'm on my last funds here. I've already killed about six hundred bucks, more or less, on vet bills in the last 6 months.

Any feedback in general? It would really be appreciated. I'm pretty frustrated right now.

[shicagah]

For anyone interested, it turns out it was infection from the extractions.

At first he thought it might have been due to some higher elevations of BUN and Creatinine, indicating early kidney disease (that he had discovered before anesthesia on the extraction date), so he went to check that out with a urinalysis.

When he came back he said the elevations had gone back into normal range and that it actually was an infection. I was ready to do a happy dance right there.

He'd given him an antibiotic shot afterward the extraction, which was supposed to last for a week. (Which I wasn't aware that it was supposed to last that long) But for whatever reason, it didn't work by itself.

He even cut the cost of everything immensely because the shot didn't work the last time and gave me more antibiotics to give at home.

So it was a great visit.

[marie73]

Great update!!

[dweamgoil]

Wonderful!

[Greenport ferals]

So glad your cat is OK.
I am feeling your relief.

[shicagah]

After the initial vet visit, Elvis was doing alright. He perked up a bit and threw up only once during the night afterward.

Today I happened to be visiting a friend who is visiting from another state, so my Mom was the one who was home with Elvis was the emergency occurred. I gave him one dose of the clavamox that the vet prescribed before I left.

Apparently he threw up again, some more bile, but was back to his weakened state. About an hour later he threw up again, but this time he had no bile left (he hadn't eaten in more than 24hrs) and he threw up diarrhea.

Mom rushed him to the vet and he's there for the night. I wasn't informed of this until 9PM, by my sister, because nobody thought to inform me until then. It occurred around 4:30PM.

I have nothing to go off of but his previous symptoms and what my mother has informed me of. I was a mess earlier as I can't even contact the vet until in the morning, but I settled into some research.

Is there any chance that this could be due to Metacam Injections? He had heightened BUN and Creatinine levels after a couple visits. The vet visits started on August 27th with metacam injections on these dates:
August 27th
October 20th
December 7th
With a few visits where these didn't occur.

Not one of those was the date of his actual dental surgery. The date of his surgery was Dec. 3rd.

I realize that there is a month or so between the injections, but I don't know if there could be a correlation between the injections and the symptoms. (Lethargy, incessant vomiting, no appetite/thirst, little litterbox use).

What do you think? Am I looking to hard at the Metcam or is it a legitimate concern, even though the injections were "spaced out"?

[shicagah]

Elvis died last night. Thanks for the comments from the three who posted.

[RachandNito]

OMG I am SO sorry to hear about your poor Elvis. This is so sudden! This has got to be so hard for you, to have him fine one day and declining so suddenly.

From what I know, I would definitely suspect the Metacam.

According to the manufacturer’s product sheet, Metacam has a narrow margin of safety (also known as therapeutic index) in cats, meaning that there is very little difference between a safe, effective dose and a toxic dose. Repeated doses of Metacam in cats have been known to result in death, as documented in the clinical tests submitted to the FDA.

(Taken from http://www.persiancats.org/FODWVG/do...ks_In_Cats.pdf)

[marie73]

OMG, I am so sorry. Cinderella had a bad experience once with Metacam during a dental visit, but nothing like this.

I'm so very sorry for your loss.