Re: Experience with GSPC?
  By: Janis Kracht to Damon A. Getsman on Thu Apr 10 2014 13:30:14

 > Looks like it's caused by a number of factors, dental disease, dental
 > infection, and an immune reaction to the bacteria/viruses in the cat's mouth
 > any cat can get this it seems :(
 > 
 > I found a page of natural-type treaments using vitamins, probiotics but you
 > know those can get expensive as well..  Maybe you have some of the vitamins,
 > etc. mentioned here at your house already:
 > http://www.petremedycharts.com/Learning%20Center/Nutrition/page159/page159.h
 > Some good ideas there maybe, I don't really know.
 > 
 > If a cat has bad gum disease, or dental infections, vitamins sure aren't goi
 > to make those two things go away though - maybe they might help keep it unde
 > control once it's a little better?  Again, I don't know...  Poor kitty.
 > 
 > I saw suggestions of dental extractions of loose teeth by your vet, that kin
 > of thing.. and the course of medication you mention is about all I saw as
 > well.. (antibiotics and corticosteroids).
 > http://www.hometownvetcare.com/feline-gingivitis-stomatitis-pharyngitis-comp
 > 
 > This site above is a from a vet in Iowa.. she seems to have dealt with it a
 > bit.
 > 
 > I hope something here helps - I know what a drag it was when _I_ had to go o
 > steroids.. made every infection I had worse, and more. :(

    Yeah.  It probably would've been arrested if I would've been able to get it
treated early on.  Unfortunately, my assets were locked up to the point where I
was unable to get the money for treatment for over 6, probably closer to 9,
months.  This because I could not convince the person who had responsibility
for the cat's health at that time that the smell I noticed coming out of his
mouth was a disease, nor that his behavior was changing due to serious pain. 
I'm...  unhappy...  about this turn of events.  This cat, along with his
identical twin, who was lost about 4-5 years ago, helped protect my son and I
during our cross-country adventures backpacking (when my son was 2.5).  He's
well trained, just like his brother; they'd run off to hunt in a forest,
desert, the plains, wherever, despite having never been there, and they'd come
back minutes after I'd call them, well beyond my range of sight.  Most of the
time bringing handouts of small rodents and birds for us, as well.  :)  Anyway,
huge story, massive digression, but those cats were the only living creatures
that stuck by me to that point in my life, I'm quite attached.
    I'll look into the natural treatments; anything that I can possibly do is
better than doing nothing while waiting for the funding for the next treatment
this time around.  :(  Especially with the amount of pain that he's in right
now.
    He already had a surgery by the first rather incompetent vets.  They took
out 2 teeth and never bothered doing the pathology to tell me wtf was going on.
Then the veterinarian that I have now, in the new city, started treating the
first time after a biopsy and proper pathology with the exact same treatment. 
Not something that I really wanted to see, knowing that the infection already
had resistance to that _exact_ treatment, not even a higher dosage or more
prolonged period of treatment.  :(
    Steroids are the only thing that give him relief, but yeah...  the side
effects...  maybe I'll see if I can feed him soggy food longer and let the
immune system tagteam along with whatever antibiotics they decide to try out
this time around.  This after a bit of a discussion about wasting time with
low-grade treatments that probably won't work due to the time that the disease
has had to set in.  I don't have the money to try out every card in the deck,
nor will I be able to do one treatment after another in rapid-fire.  I would
think that justifies stepping up the level of force a bit, so long as it is not
creating undue risk for the animal.
    Thank you for the information!

    -D

   -- guh up the effbomb down wif yr bad self

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