Hobb’s story
Hobbs, a sweet and happy 8-year-old Domestic Short Haired cat came to us at Anderson Moores last November when his owners noticed that he was suddenly paralysed in his back legs when he tried to jump off the sofa and just dragged his legs, but they couldn’t find an injury. He was instantly referred to us.
Hobbs underwent a number of tests including a heart scan, blood samples, an examination of his heart’s electrical activity with an Echocardiography (ECG), and he had a 24-hour Holter ECG monitoring device fitted.
He was diagnosed with Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), Congestive heart failure (fluid in his lungs and around his heart) and Feline arterial thromboembolism (FATE), a blood clot.
HCM is a heart muscle disease where the muscle becomes thickened, stiff and fibrotic over a prolonged period and can lead to congestive heart failure. Also, with thromboembolism which is secondary to his heart disease, the clot can occasionally detach and travel around the body (arterial thromboembolism). Most commonly the clot blocks the blood supply to the back legs, and this is what happened to Hobbs, he was suddenly unable to move his back legs. This can be life-threatening so it was fortunate he got a quick diagnosis.
He was hospitalised and gradually got back to eating and not showing pain with gradual improvement in movement of his back legs, the Congestive heart failure has been resolved and feline arterial thromboembolism (clot) is under control.
He went home with a whole host of different medications some that he will need for life. Since being discharged he has generally been well at home, his owners felt his breathing was back to normal and so was his eating and drinking, he also wasn’t limping anymore. So they were very relieved and happy.
