I didn’t stop giving Austen her pills abruptly when she went into remission. It was a more gradual thing.
When we started the chemo treatment, I gave her the Leukeran pills every other day, and the prednisone drops on the alternate days. We did that for almost a year. When she showed signs of being in remission, her oncologist changed that to Leukeran twice a week; we did that for six months and they checked her again last spring. The oncologist said I could take her completely off the pills then, but we had to taper off the drops over the course of a month. She has her next follow-up near the end of March.
Best of luck with your kitty! When I started out with Austen, I never expected that this would turn out as well as it has.
Thanks for sharing your experience with others. My kitty was presumptively diagnosed with small cell lymphoma on 6/21/2013 (e.g. with and ultrasound but no abdominal biopsy). Did you also have a presumptive diagnosis or a firm diagnoses via biopsy?
We’ve been on 10 mg Pred SID and Chlorambucil tabs 3 times a week for about 4 weeks and have seen no weight gain yet…am getting increasingly worried. Not sure if you recall the timing of the turnaround for your kitty and whether you saw any within 5 weeks?
She had a biopsy of tissue samples from her intestines and liver.
As I remember, she stopped vomiting right away, but her weight was slow to come back up. Does your vet have a/d–that’s a prescription pet food for cats and dogs that are recovering from surgery or an illness and need to gain weight. That helped Austen. We also talked about other foods to help her regain weight.
I was going to bring this old thread back up anyway, to say that Austen died this past weekend. She was still in remission, but her kidneys finally and suddenly gave out.
She was 19 years old and lived over a year and half beyond her prognosis. I’m upset about it, but I knew she couldn’t go on much longer–even healthy cats don’t always live this long. We did everything we could for her.
I am sorry for your loss. I am glad that you were able to enjoy the extra year and a half with her (which for her is a bigger chunk of time than for you). And yes, she lived a long life even if she had been completely healthy.
I’d be wary about diagnosing lymphoma, let alone a specific type (even if it is one of the most common) by ultrasound only. Are you sure no ultrasound-guided biopsy or cytology was performed? Not even a fine-needle aspirate?
I’m sorry for your loss. I had to put one of my cats down about three weeks ago, and it absolutely destroyed me for a while. It sounds like Austen had a good life, and part of that is knowing when to let her go.
I’m certain, KarlGrenze. No needle biopsy during the u/s. The next option is, of course, exploratory to get biopsies but wanted to try this medical route first to prevent unnecessary pain to Matisse. Just wondering how long I should reasonably wait on this course assuming the presumptive diagnosis before opting for surgery.
Depending on where the mass is on u/s, they could use endoscopy (less invasive, but not every veterinarian does it). Exploratory is the preferred, true. But, even a fine needle aspirate (cytology, which is not a biopsy) could give a better idea of what it is than just u/s.
My cat was diagnosed with Lymphoma in July 2012. She has been on prednisolone (feline prednisone) and Lukeran. I was told she would live another 1 to 2 years and she surpassed that timeline. She is definitely slowing down, but still eating, sleeping with me, purring, jumping onto furniture, etc. I was afraid of Lukeran at first, but I only wear a glove to give it to her then throw the glove out. So I’ve basically been handling this drug with my cat for 2 1/2 years now and I’ve never gotten sick from it. I don’t wear gloves when cleaning her litter box and I still let her wash me, and I have never had any effects from this. I hope this helps alleviate your fears a bit.