Cat kidney failure: Can my cat recover after delayed treatment?

Poor Echo! This definitely looks like kidney disease from first glance. Since he is only 8 months old I would be concerned about acute. BUT I would certainly want to recheck his kidney values soon as well as an urinalysis. The concentration of his urine will also help to determine if these values are truly due to kidney failure or something else. Since he is so young, I would also consider having an abdominal ultrasound done on his kidneys to see if he is suffering from polycystic kidney disease. I hope this helps!

Sorry to hear about your kitty. It sounds like he is in the advanced stages of kidney failure. Unfortunately kidney damage can not be reversed once it occurs - only managed. Once cats get to this stage of kidney disease, most treatments are focused on trying to make cats feel as good as possible for as long as possible. Sometimes treatments that are prescribed include SQ fluids (water given as an injection under the skin to increase hydration), anti-nausea medications, blood pressure medications, antacids, and other therapies to manage complications associated with kidney failure. It is hard to give a prognosis without knowing the specific details of your cat's bloodwork and history, but if he is not eating or drinking, he may be suffering and can quickly decline. If you are concerned about your kitty's quality of life, have a discussion with your veterinarian.

Part of this decision should be based upon how Squeakers is doing clinically and how bad or not bad his values are. In general, if kidney disease is caught early on, it responds very well to treatment. Most of the time, treatment is simply a diet change to a kidney friendly, prescription diet. Pet’s where the disease is more advanced, may need to take a pill to decrease protein loss through the kidneys and they may need subcutaneous fluids on a daily or weekly basis. For cats with more advanced disease, they may need hospitalization and IV fluids to see if they will recover. Again it all depends on the blood values and how the pet is doing clinically. Most cats with kidney disease, if caught in time, will live an average of 2 to 3 years of quality life after diagnosis. This is variable though. Some pets progress quickly and others live longer than 3 years. You don’t know until you try. I hope this helps to guide your decision making. You can also find a fair amount of information about kidney disease on this website. Use the search feature. Please feel free to post any additional questions.

Poor Peque, these are very severe kidney changes. An acute kidney injury in a young patient does have a chance of recovery and return to reduced but sufficient function depending on the severity of the injury and degree of scarring which develops. The results on Monday and again 3days after the intravenous fluids are stopped will tell a lot about his ability to recover

It's common for kidney values to improve with aggressive treatment (such as hospitalization for IV fluids). Sometimes they don't improve even with treatment, which would be a bad sign, or sometimes they improve while hospitalized, but don't stay improved. So, I can't get much idea about her prognosis from what they've told you so far. If they are happy with her progress, they will likely discharge her after 1-3 days and then have you come back to have her kidney values checked after a week, which will give you much more information. It's possible they are being vague because they just don't know yet -- it's impossible to know how she'll do out of the hospital. I'd recommend asking them what the next steps are, when she can go home, what treatments she'll need at home, and what the follow up testing will look like. You can also directly ask about prognosis. Wishing you the best of luck

I'm so very sorry to hear this. Sometimes cats in renal failure start to develop other issues concurrently, his guts are likely upset leading to diarrhoea. Depending on the cause the vet may be able to treat it with antibiotics and probiotics if an infection or inflammation is present. I think it certainly would be worth giving treatment a try for a few days. Unfortunately renal failure can be very hard on cats and you both have my utmost sympathy.

I'm so sorry to hear about Sylvester and your loss. It sounds like you did everything you could for him and he was likely in renal failure. Sometimes this is treatable, other times the kidneys do not recover and cats may need dialysis or even a renal transplant. It sounds like you did everything right by him but his condition was too severe.