Heart failure, anything else to try?
We’re in the US. We’ve had Scarlett (female, spayed, approx 8yo) for almost 7 years. She was a rescue from a hoarding situation. She’s absolutely tiny and the sweetest, most human-loving cat you could imagine.
Recently, she started having a runny nose and labored breathing. She lost her appetite. Thought she had a cold. Wasn’t getting better after a week, so took her to the vet.
After an xray, she was diagnosed with heart failure. They removed a bunch of fluid from her chest, and started her on pimobendan and furosemide. They warned us they didn’t know how much time she had. This was just over a week ago.
It helped so much, for about a week. Yesterday, 8 days after the procedure, she’s started breathing a little hard again and having the same symptoms as before.
Obviously we can’t afford to have her chest drained every week or two, and we wouldn’t want to put her through that. Is there anything else we can do to buy her a little more time?
Realistically I know it’s time to say goodbye, but I’m 39 weeks pregnant and Scarlett has been glued to me since before I even took a test. I want her to be able to meet our baby, even if they can’t have the years of troublemaking together we imagined they would.
Is there anything else we can do for Scarlett?