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Pyometria DiscussionQ. I have a female that was 3 weeks pregnant. I noticed she was not doing well, and a small pus discharge. I took her to the vet who did the blood test and said it is an "open" pyo case. He gave her a shot and placed her on medications. The next day she was back to her normal self, running and talking, playing with the other cats and eating well. it has been a week now. She is still on meds . The question I have is, she is filling out rather rapidly. Her tummy is much larger than normal, but the vet said, she cannot be pregnant due to the pyo. So, why the enlarged tummy? What antibiotics do you recommend? A1. I am just curious what "shot" and medication was used? And what did the blood test showed that made the vet believe it was Pyo? Did the vet test the actual discharge??? A2. The "Cat Owner's Veterinary Handbook" reads "Hysterectomy is the treatment of choice.....If it is especially important to preserve the fertility of the queen, prostaglandin therapy along with antibiotics may be attempted. Prostaglandin PGF2 relaxes the cervix, stimulates uterine contractions and evacuates the pus. It is administered by subcutaneous injection daily for several days. The discharge is cultured, and the queen is placed on appropriate antibiotic, selected on the basis of sensitivity tests. Antibiotics should be continued for 3-4 weeks. Prostaglandin therapy is accompanied by a number of dose-related side effects, including shock. Uterine rupture may occur when the cervix is closed." I would take her back and see what the vet gave you and find out why this is happening. a ruptured uterus in this instance is usually fatal. also the book goes on to say that reoccurrence of pyo is common in a cat who has had it once. you need to breed her shortly after she has fully recovered from this and not let her go for very long going in and out of heat. there may be more up-to-date info on this, but I believe this treatment is fairly recent. they used to spay all pyo cases, without exception. I hope this helps and I hope your girl is OK. please keep us posted. this is a very scary condition that every breeder needs to be aware of....pearl A3. This is how I have proceeded with diagnosis and treatment: I noticed a discharge (pussy bloody) no other symptoms presented. She ate fine, eliminated fine, and behaved fine, and she did not have a fever. Took her to the vet had a blood test done to count white blood cells. It was very high. Then did an x-ray to look at the size of the uterus. It was enlarged. Diagnosis Pyometria open because she was discharging. At that point we did a vaginal swap and culture to determine which antibiotic the infection was sensitive to, during the interim put her on Baytril and gave leutilyce (pardon the spelling) to cause the uterus to discharge the infection. leutilyce needs to be given at specific intervals and there is a danger involved. My Vet kept her for a week during which time he did a couple of blood tests to check the white blood cell count. At first it did not come down at all, and I was considering a spay If she had developed symptoms that were life endangering I would have spayed, then all of a sudden it dropped about day 6 of treatment. I brought her home gave final injection of leutylice and continued baytril for the remainder of the 21 day protocal. Baytril was determined by the culture results to be the antibiotic of choice. When she next came into heat after finishing the Baytril I bred her. She had 3 kittens live but one of them was the only kitten I ever had to put down due to a flat chest. She has been fine ever since over 2 years ago. She has also had normal pregnancies and kittens. Good luck, A4. As I have also dealt in the treatment of PYO, just thought I would add to the pool of documented success stories. First sign of infection was a visible greyish discharge. Even though everyone I spoke with said that you needed to administer leutilyce, Lorre Smith had told me she had been successful in treating Pyo without it, so we proceeded with the following treatment, I just cut and pasted what I had written to the list back then..... We decided to go with the Injectible Baytril (.4 ml) twice daily and Oral Liquid Clavamox (1 ml) twice daily. Within five days her white count went from 55,000 to 23,000 so that was certainly a relief to see it knocked down so quickly. With the white count still higher than normal, I took her to the K State Vet Med Center and had an ultra-sound done where I was given more good news ~ there was no liquid build-up or any sign of infection within her uterus. At this time all feel that she will have a full recovery with a couple more weeks on the Oral Clavamox and will hopefully be fine for re-breeding. Thanks again for all the advice and I hope that sharing my experiences with treating this infection, will add to the pool of possibilities in dealing with this in the future. ........If I am remembering correctly we used the injectible Baytril for seven days and the oral liquid clavomox for 3 weeks. I just wanted people to know that there has been success in treating PYO without the use of leutilyce, since this is such a dangerous drug with sometimes fatal side effects. Oh by the way, I too had a flat-chested kitten in the next litter, with normal kittens in the next two litters. I had suspected it was the Baytril and Laura's experiences might support this suspicion. Hope this helps. Q2. Has anyone else been advised to use ORBAX tablets - 5.7 mg per day in place of Baytril injections. Supposed to be a less harmful form. A1. After seemingly to have treated one of our queens successfully after another breeding she began to show the same symptoms and the kittens died within and she had to have a caesarian and be spayed. My vet did some further research to discover that it might well have been the male that was the carrier of the infection and had we treated him with Baytril along with her perhaps we would not have lost that litter and her reproductive system. He was, of course, treated thereafter and has produced 2 successful litters since. A2. Orbax is not a "less harmful" form of Baytril. Both drugs are in the same family of antibiotics, called quinolones. These drugs have been shown to have an affect on cartilage development in immature dogs, but the same has not been tested in immature cats. Orbax is contraindicated for the same things that Baytril is. You can get details on Veterinary drugs at this website http://dil.vetmed.vt.edu/ 520.1616 Orbifloxacin tablets. Speaking for myself, I have used baytril extensively for a number of years without difficulty. I love it. What I don't love is what the dang company is doing with it price wise. THe next time I go to Mexico I am going to be looking for a veternarian that has it cheaper. Does anyone know of a place?
Q3. Tell me more about this Baytril thing..... I am freaking out here since my Splash just finished some Baytril tabs. I am shipping her to be bred in a couple of weeks!! A1. I don't think there is anything to freak out about as Baytril is a very high dosage antibiotic is all. My point was that the male (if it was the male used when the queen first contracted the PYO) should be treated as well. If this is the case with your queen then you need to talk to the owner of the stud. There is some evidence that if the cats are on Baytril when conception takes place that it could lead to birth defects so you will want to be sure the male and your queen are both finished with their treatments before putting them together. A2. I bred my queen four weeks after finishing with Baytril and had one flat ribbed kitten out of three that were born. I hadn't had this happen prior to the Baytril and have not seen in since. I have had two litters with this queen since her recovery from Pyo. Don't want to freak you out, by any means. Just wanted to share my experience with the Baytril. I was simply crushed when I had to have the flat chested baby put down. A3. Since we are on the subject of using antibiotics (Baytril) I wanted to add one more thing about medication. I learned the hard way. I found out that Metronidazol should never be used during breeding or during pregnancy, due to it causing defects in the kittens. I lost one to a major deformity. It's intestines grew on the outside of its body. It was really sad. She had been on this medication a few days before she went in heat and not know the side affects I sent her to the breeder and the breeder gave her the medication while she was there. I just wanted other breeders to know this, even though you all probably do, but me being new at this, I just wanted to share my experience. Thanks for listening. Is there any other evidence that the Metronidazol was the culprit? We have used it from time to time, and have never seen any deformities, nor have I seen any precautions against using it on pregnant females. I did find this, tho... Metronidazol (fx. Elyzol, flagyl)
Last Updated: 7 July 2001 |
