Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with prognosis

Will I end up spending $$$ and still end up with a dead cat?

parilous — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 08:44:32 -0800

[cat filter] Can anyone give me a story in which their cat started sneezing blood but stayed healthy? After losing our 12-year old cat four months ago (kidney failure; vet bill = $1200) and niece's 3-year old cat last month (lymphoma caused pleural effusion; vet bill = $2K), we swore off another pet for financial reasons. Having been a cat owner for 15 years, loneliness got the better of me and I brought home an 8-month old cat from the animal control shelter 10 days ago. (In retrospect, this was my first bad decision.)

His medical history was spotty, though he was tested for FeLV and given a rabies shot (bad decision #2; should have required more proof of vaccinations, etc). He developed a cold three days after bringing him home, starting as a runny left eye, then fully manifested in congestion and sneezing. At his checkup, the vet said that he was healthy and that a cold was typical for a shelter animal. He was prescribed 1ml of Clavamox orally, 2x/ daily. We are almost a week into that treatment.

His appetite has been fine and he drinks lots of water. He's active and playful and other than the congestion, he's seemingly healthy.

This morning, he sneezed blood. Twice. A Google search returned dozens of stories of cats who had sneezed blood and resulted in a diagnosis of cancer or related illness that was terminal after dozens of expensive diagnostic tests and treatment attempts.

We honestly (honestly!) can't afford any more major vet bills (we have tenuous jobs, live in a crappy economy, and are raising my sister's kid) and probably should have never brought home another pet until we had a vet budget established (bad decision #3).

However, here we are, and the crux of the question is this: I'm feeling quite pessimistic about his chances given what I've read so far, so I cannot justify spending the money for diagnosis and treatment if the end result is a dead cat (though I'm not sure what my next steps would be).

Therefore, I'm hoping to get stories of cats who had similar problems but it turned out to be something simple and treatable to give me hope that it's worth a trip to the vet. Feel free to reprimand me for adopting an animal without having financial ability for care, though it may be ineffective in making me feel worse than I already do.

Treating achilles tendonitis on my own

rosebuddy — Wed, 21 May 2008 13:03:10 -0800

I seem to have classic achilles tendonitis and am trying to treat it myself. What treatments worked for you? At what point should I just give up and go to a doctor and get professional assessment and physiotherapy? I've been doing a lot of hill walking without stretching adequately and am now paying the price. A couple of days ago, I found that both achilles tendons were very tight and sore when I got up in the morning, especially when I tried to walk down stairs. They hurt only slightly going upstairs and usually aren't sore at rest or when I do a little walking around the house. Starting yesterday, I've been doing the following.

Resting: no long walks, cycling, etc.
Icing: 3-4 times a day
(not Compressing yet. Should I?)
(not Elevating yet. There doesn't seem to be a need.)

I'm taking Tylenol to fight the inflammation and do gentle wall stretches when I get up in the morning. I've also started wearing good supportive shoes around the house instead of going barefoot.

Normally, I would already be at the sports medicine clinic instead of asking for advice here. But my new medical insurer is auditing my account after I submitted my first claim a month after signing up. They won't even pay for my prescriptions right now, and I have no idea how much longer it will take to resolve this. I'm trying to stay away from any medical consultation unless it's really needed.

Am I on the right track with self-therapy? Is there anything else I should consider?

How scared should we be?

daisyace — Fri, 25 Aug 2006 13:44:20 -0800

If a biopsied spot turns out to be melanoma, what's likely to happen and what's not? Is there only a remote chance of needing chemo, radiation, or other terrifying stuff, or more than a remote chance? (Percentages, anyone?) I have some related questions, too. Three or so months ago, my husband had an ink-black spot under his toenail, or maybe on it -- we couldn't tell which. It looked as if he bumped his toe. After about a month, on a day spent tromping around in the water and hiking, it disappeared. But, the exact same place started going from very light gray to darker gray -- again, we can't tell if it's on the skin or the nail. A dermatologist he saw today said she sees some brown, and she's having him get a biopsy a week from Tuesday. She didn't find any more spots. My husband grew up in a beach town, with lots of sunburns, and his father's father had skin cancer on his face.

My husband thinks the spot might be moving along with the nail as the nail grows, though. Would that be inconsistent with melanoma, and what would it be consistent with?

If it is melanoma, how worried should we be, and about what possibilities? My ideal answer would be facts like, "x% of this kind of melanoma leads to y happening." (Well, my ideal answer would actually be, "What you describe doesn't sound like melanoma because...," but I'll take what I can get.)

Also, they've told him his foot will be encased in a boot after the biopsy. How bad will the biopsy be, and for how long afterwards?

I'd also be interested in recommendations for other discussion boards that would intelligently address this topic.