wrote:
On Mar 9, 12:59 pm, Poe wrote:
Just a quick update on my one year old cat, Peanut, who I posted about
last week asking for information on cataracts. Forgive my use of
layman's terms, but I'm not yet up on the technical terms wrt cat eyes!

Anyway, I took Peanut to a specialist today. Glad I did. Now we have a
good data to start with to use for measuring growth rate of the
cataracts going forward.

He has two - one in each eye. His left eye looks, for now, like a kind
that might remain fairly static, not a lot of growth.

His right eye has a larger cataract, and it appears to be the kind that
will grow over time. I have a follow-up schedule in 6 months to monitor
how quickly that will happen.

He is not yet blind, and the vet doesn't think he will be any time soon.
When the time comes, surgery is highly successful on cats, even more so
than in dogs.

Glaucoma is not a concern - eye pressure and a few other tests were
done, and we're good there (for now).

His retinas look healthy and attached, which is a good thing. No
disconnects there :-)

Trauma is not the suspected cause, because that would typically be some
kind of blunt force, and not usually in both eyes for that kind of trauma.

Here's the interesting think I learned today - they're seeing cat
cataracts, a relatively rare condition apparently, in higher rates with
cats that were raised primarily on cat milk replacement (how these guys
were raised). Mama lactated some, more as time went on, but their diet
was mostly milk replacement, especially in the beginning before mama
eventually seemed to catch up over a period of a few weeks, though she
never completely caught up.

So - thought I'd share. Things are good for now, glad I took the advice
to get him in so I have a good starting point from which to monitor
progress.

Oh - he mentions drops that are being marketed as a solution, said he
hasn't seen them really make a difference, but gave me the info to
google and if I want, try out.

Thanks for the information - and I am very glad that there is nothing
else going on with your cat's eyes but the cataracts. As he is so
young, he will very likely adapt well and easily to his reduced
acuity, enhancing his other senses in compensation.

My $0.02 on the drops - if you think it is possible that the cataracts
are caused by either a vitamin deficiency or a vitamin uptake problem
(both possible given your cat's early history) then I would go for the
drops. In point of fact, and given that there are no other
complications, I would try the drops anyway just on general principle
as doing tests for uptake deficiencies would be very expensive and
even then uncertain - and the drops look pretty benign in general. But
if there is no improvement over a month or so, you might want to re-
consider.

Good luck with him - he seems to be in good hands.

Peter Wieck
Melrose Park, PA


Thanks. I may give them a try, and then discuss again with the eye
doctor in 6 months. I'm going to do more research on the entire notion
of early development wrt things like nutritional deficiencies, which it
seems may be the original cause, if milk replacement is indeed a
suspected factor in cat cataracts. Either way, I may give it a try.