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We are talking to a couple of vets but interested if any vets/doctors/opticians here can give some clues before our next appointment.
10 year old British Shorthair, male. Regular vet visits. Recently we have been keeping him in so 99% housebound.
For a couple of years he has had minor hazyness on the front of the corneas on the bottom of the eyes. After relevant tests he has had steroid eye drops off and on as needed. Colour of his eyes seems to have changed and seems to be a reflection in both eyes that obscures them when the light is angled correctly.
Then for the last year he has cloudiness within the left eye. We switched vets and they think he has only light and dark sensitivity in the left eye and no vision. I've no doubt that his vision has been poor for a while.
In the last week or two, and after a teeth checkup (visual only, needs a load out!) he suddenly seems worse. He has stopped performing his daily race around the house. His vision seems to deteriorate in the evenings, crucially both pupils enlarge fully and become huge, almost obscuring the whole of his iris, which suggests this is a blood pressure/nerve/brain issue rather than a problem with the lens or ducts in one of the two eyes. He often bumps into legs or tries to go the wrong side of an open door, but in the evening he will end up waving his legs about hunting for the floor as he jumps off the sofa, literally cannot see anything. During the daytime he will be much better and can clearly see enough to behave fairly normally.
In himself he seems comfortable albeit a little unsettled when his sight goes completely, its just weird that the level of sight, and size of the pupils seem to vary so much though the day.
Next steps is another vet visit when we'll ask for photos to be taken and see if they can involve a specialist to find out if its something treatable, if he will just go blind, or if its going to cause pain and need eye removal etc.
But any thoughts from clever sods would be appreciated 🙂
Are they red and flashing on and off?
I'm no specialist, but recent local vs specialist vets experience = £1500 on the wrong thing with the local before being referred to a specialist vet for a proper diagnosis and treatment and several thousand more in bills, here's hoping the insurance covers my current balance with the vets!
Yeh that's my worry, uninsured with a rapidly depleting vet fund!
They want nearly £1000 to pull out a load of rotten teeth but that's on hold until we get a better idea of the eye issue, the teeth can wait as they don't seem to be bothering him!
Our old tabby went blind like this - could negotiate better during the day and in the garden. Her's started after a really bad chest infection and low oxygen - night in vet hospital.
She manages OK, but also has arthritis so hasn't been tearing about for years. She stays in now, and we only let her in the back garden in good weather - she can't jump out. She's more recently stopped jumping off stuff and remains on the floor, although occasionally will go up and down stairs. Fortunately, the other four cats, who are young, leave her well alone and respect that she's old - so don't dive on her when they play fight.
https://icatcare.org/advice/blindness/ icatcare-org website is my go-to source of cat info, fabulous charity!
Thanks Anorak, useful link!
Initial outcome is inflammation in both eyes and restart treatment with steroid drops.
Cataracts in both eyes, unsure if causing the inflamation, or the inflamation has caused the cataracts.
Left eye the lens is partially detached so the void at the front of the eye is enlarged, glycoma drops prescribed to reduce iris size as otherwise the lens may fall into the front of the eye and cause a hole...
If the drops don't work, its £2-3k to remove the lens 😮