Help Me Eat Pain-Free For 1st Xmas!
As much as I hate to ask for help, I am doing this for him and his health.
Mister Sir Walnut is an almost 7 month old extreme cream tabby Persian who typically loves to play, investigate, cuddle, and otherwise think of himself as a true hunter and stealth lion. However, lately Walnut hasn't been acting much like himself.
Over the span of the last 6-8 weeks, Walnut showed intermittent changed behaviours such as sleeping more, increased aggression during grooming, isolating himself, eating fluctuations from days where he'd be a porker to days of barely touching his food, decreased grooming, constipation to diarrhea to normalcy, sneezing, coughing fits that at first seemed like massive furballs except he has never had a furball or thrown up, chewing on everything more often, and stinky breath that seemed to only get worse.
Because Walnut is a kitten he was already attending veterinary appointments for his vaccinations, boosters, and examinations every 2-4 weeks consistently from the time I got him in July up until his last FeLV booster received on Sept. 7th (after testing negative for FeLV and FIV late July).
Since Walnut is my first young kitten and my first purebred kitty, I tend to double check any facts I've learned about and ask (too) many questions of his vet. I was reassured each time that his health was great. The intermittent symptoms were thought to be him reacting to his vaccinations (he is sensitive so we broke them up into multiple visits as best as possible), him going through the normal teething stage, and some likely related inhalent allergies.
In standard follow up communications, I restated my concerns and specifically asked about dental care and best brands to use since his adult teeth were going to be done coming in sometime during September. A generic response was given where I was advised by the vet about the existence of a commercial kibble supposedly designed for dental health, which was generally recommended since brushing a cat's teeth can be quite the daunting challenge for some owners.
As some of you already know and the vet definitely knew, Walnut eats a species appropriate and balanced commercial raw diet, so kibble wasn't really an option unless otherwise was no other choice. His breed is prone to painful and potentially fatal kidney issues often caused by crystals that can form from dehydration, so wet food is preferable. He has been fed raw since weaned since his breeder fed a raw homemade diet to him and all the other cats at the cattery. So I decided to address this dental health by using a well known water additive that claims to reduce plaque and look into brush and toothpaste options over the next few weeks.
On October 13th I took Walnut to the vet's office for an urgent appointment after about a week of increasing symptoms. At this point he was so loud when breathing and snoring, and his breath and eye discharge so noticeable that I thought maybe he had managed to lodge something up his tiny nose, or had possibly developed an abscessed tooth.
I was asked how I hadn't noticed his gums were inflamed and raw red in the 4 weeks it'd been since myast vet appointment, and then told that he had developed an oral infection of his gums. The infection needed to be treated so we could prevent it from turning into something called stomatitis which I had never heard of, and the vet advised me that Walnut likely had an upper respiratory virus as well. This seemed off to me since he has and had zero contact with other cats to catch a virus from, but his breath was pretty horrendous at this point. After learning about expensive bloodwork that could be done to test for "many different things", Walnut was put on 10 days worth of antibiotics and the water additive was no longer used just to be sure he wasn't reacting to something in it.
This seemed to help curb his red, raw, and seriously inflamed gums so I assumed he was on the mend until I noticed that the redness and inflammation that was partially gone after 10 days of treatment was now getting worse just 48 hours after he had taken his last dose of antibiotics.
I opted for a second opinion which we received 2 days ago. At that time Walnut was diagnosed with severe juvenile onset stomatitis - an incredibly painful, chronic, and progressive condition resulting from his immune system overreacting and mistaking his newly formed adult teeth as enemies. It's technically the plaque that his system reacts to, and although his teeth are in great condition and appear white and healthy, there will always be a bit of plaque and bacteria on them from eating.
Unfortunately the only thing we can do to help him long term and that has consistently shown results while limiting the risk of secondary problems from side effects (not to mention the costs of needing lifelong/15 years worth of medications) is to have him get surgery for a full dental extraction of all of his teeth.
Obviously I want the best for him and to limit the risks involved in a surgery that will take multiple hours, and is already heightened since he is a brachycephalic (flat-faced) breed, we need to have this done by a board certified dental specialist. Unfortunately, there are only a handful in Canada so we will have to be going out of town for this.
My first choice is to use Dr. Fraser Hale in Guelph who is an expert in this field and is experienced with brachycephalic breeds. Either way, all certified board specialists charge about the same rates regardless, and since we will need to head to the Mississauga area we might as well go the extra 40 minutes to Guelph for some of the best and highly recommended care possible.
The cost of his surgery alone is estimated at around $2300 + tax, but this could change once he's under anesthesic and can have a full exam and dental x-rays completed. Plus the cost of transportation/gas for the ride (I don't have a car).
In the meantime, he will need to start three months of hypoallergenic clinical diet to limit inflammation possibly caused by food allergens, buprenorphine to manage his pain, and interferon to help suppress his immune system. Also, he will need to have pre-anthestic bloodwork completed by his regular vet prior to surgery and sent no later than 1 week before his appointment.
And since I have been laid off from the end of July when the company I worked for went bankrupt, any personal savings have been used up by this point between living expenses and the 5 veterinarian bills incurred over the last 4 months time (plus he is so cute and means so much to me that I can't help but spoil him with toys probably more often than I should).
But even more frustrating is that I thought I was being proactive when I looked into getting him health insurance and picked a plan for him in October. I thought this was great and we were ahead of schedule since I assumed that I had some time to pick a plan and that the chances of him becoming seriously ill between October and his 1 year birthday in April seemed slim, especially given how many appointments he's had already. He has only had his adult teeth for about a month.
His insurance won't take effect until November 2nd though, and because he was symptomatic prior to his coverage start date and now has been diagnosed, his stomatitis is considered preexisting meaning that they will not help with any costs related to his dental treatments, associated services, or dietary requirements.
Dr. Hale's office is scheduling for December right now. From everything I've read and been told, the chance of his surgery being successful in completely curing his stomatitis is 60-80% but the longer that this is put off the less likely this becomes.
Walnut is 6.5 months old and still has much growing to do over the next few months, and I am worried about how he will develop since he is eating far less than normal most days (approximately 1/3rd of his normal amount based on three weeks ago). Walnut experiences increasingly severe pain when eating, even if it's just mashed up canned food, to the point of obviously being hungry and wanting his food but turning away and refusing to eat because of the pain. It is actually heartbreaking to watch.
This will be Walnut's very first Christmas so I had already wanted it to be special for him. But now all we could ever want for Christmas is for him to be able to eat and at and live the rest of his long life pain-free.
Will you please help me help him and make his first Christmas wish come true?
We both thank you so very much in advance for any and all support offered. I just really can't make this happen without you.
Here are some links about his condition and related things:
http://www.petful.com/pet-health/feline-stomatitis-feline-mouth-extraction/
http://www.catster.com/lifestyle/cats-and-stomatitis
http://veterinarynews.dvm360.com/assessing-treating-refractory-feline-chronic-gingivo-stomatitis
http://m.petmd.com/blogs/thedailyvet/dr-coates/2016/april/how-know-when-cat-hurting-33940