Well it has been a mixture of a weekend as it usually is. We have had several adoptions of cats that have been in long term care, stitched the torn eyelid of one of our newly arrived kittens from an industrial area and he is now doing well and rescued a cat that has been a victim of neglect.
We will for legal reasons, when recounting rescues, change the names of the people and cats involved in each case.
The last case we had for Saturday turned out to be more than we bargained for. A week ago we recieved a phone call from an elderly person requesting that we come and collect the cat she had been feeding for 2 years after she was left behind by the neighbours. She didnt like cats and didnt want her inside in case she knocked her over. We have a long waiting list of carers so said we would see what we could do. When in the area yesterday afternoon we dropped in to see the cat in question to assess her and determine which foster carer she would best suit.
Upon arrival we were informed that she had a sore paw and the elderly persons son had been around and pulled out what looked like a claw inbedded in her paw pad and disinfected it. He seemed to be doing his best with the cat when he could visit his mum but said she had not been eating much lately so wormed her and she had seemed a little better.
Our assessment of this poor girl was that she was badly neglected. With the wound in her paw we decided she needed to come into our care immediatley and recieve medical attention. Back at one of the clinics we are affiliated with we found her pysical condition was as follows:
- Severely underweight
- Claws so over grown that they were inbedded in her paw pads
- Moderate dehydration
- Sun damage to her ears
- Flea infested - causing mild anaemia
- Burst abscess in one of her claw beds where we think it was her own claw that had caused the problem
- High temperature due to infection from paw
- Deaf (most likely due to her being a white cat with one blue and one green eye)
We dealt with each problem as we found it, flea treatment, clipped her claws to remove them from where they were inbedded in her paw pads, gave her subcutaneous fluids for dehydration, shaved her paw and cleaned the wound then gave her some antibiotics and pain relief to make her comfortable and bring her temperature down. We then placed her in a kennel with a heating pad and lots of recovery food and water which she got into immediatley.
This little girl will be assessed by a vet on Monday to determine if her weight loss is due to lack of food or some underlying age related problem. Once this is done we will most likely stitch the wound on her paw. This is a difficult case as we pride ourselves on taking on the difficult cats to rehome and special cases. Sometimes this is not always in the best interest of the cats quality of life and the best thing for the cats welfare is to put them to sleep. We hope this isnt going to be the case with this girl as she is very sweet and snuggly but rehoming older cats with multiple, ongoing problems is very difficult as people dont want them very often.
We will keep you all updated as to her progress :)
Nat @ 9 Lives Cat Rescue
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