Hepatic Lipidosis and Feeding Tube Experience?

[sweetptater]

I'll try to keep this brief, so please bear with me...

My 6 year old cat had a feeding tube put in yesterday. Last Thursday I took her to the vet because we realized she wasn't acting like herself and she had suddenly lost a LOT of weight. (14 pounds down to 8 pounds over the course of 1-2 weeks). Vet did tests and found her liver enzymes(?) were extremely high and that she was anemic. We took her for an u/s on Friday which came back fine. The vet then did a liver needle biopsy to check for lymphoma, which was the only thing that fit all of her symptoms. It came back negative on Monday, however showed signs of hepatic lipadosis. This doesn't explain the anemia, but we'd already spent over $1000 on her and the bone marrow biopsy would have been another $1000 which is money we just don't have.

Over the weekend we had been force feeding her with a syringe and she had actually shown some improvement. She started purring again, her eyes, which were completely dilated from Friday - Sunday, were about half as dilated as they had been, and she came up from the basement and was walking (unsteadily) around. So we decided to move forward with a feeding tube and treat the anemia blindly with steroids.

The purpose of the feeding tube is to keep her fed until she starts eating on her own again. According to the vet, this could be a few days, a few weeks, a few months, or might not happen at all. The only cure for the hepatic lipidosis is eating. I'm not sure at what point we should give up the fight if she doesn't improve any further. I don't want to prolong her misery unnecessarily, but right now she's just laying around and acting.......blank I guess. She looks at you when you interact with her, but she just doesn't seem all there. 

I'm hoping someone has some experience with this and can give me an idea of what to expect with regards to how long it took for their cat to start eating or recover from something like this. Anyone?

[SallySparrow]

It can take time for them to get back to normal. Our cat had it when she was four. We also had to force feed her with a syringe until she started eating on her own. That took a couple weeks and us leaving samples of every cat food imaginable out until she felt good enough to eat on her own, and picked one that she would eat. It took a few months before she was back up to a healthy weight and acting like her old self.

Honestly, this is a decision best made between you and your vet, since you know your cat better than anyone, you know? But personally, as long as there was any kind of improvement being shown, I'd keep trying to treat. It can take some time.

I hope she perks up and starts feeling better! I know how hard and stressful this is.