mdsu wrote:
I'm more than a little angry about this situation and have let the
humane society know about it. If their vet is not incompetent, then I'm
led to the conclusion that they purposely withheld information from me
about Charlie's medical condition.

Rich

What type of murmur exactly is this?

In any case, regardless, be extremely careful of the condition of the
teeth.

With cats this is for sure, teeth problems go straight to the heart.
It's probably the same for people but it's not been studied that much
with people.

If the murmur is caused by valve irregularities, then the bacteria from
the teeth, traveling in the blood stream, have an easy time latching
onto the valves. Then there is a life threatening condition of
bacterial endocarditis.

I have noticed that people doctors will also miss a murmur. They just
want the individual in and out and are doing the most cursory of
stethoscope examinations. Although most doctors will say that murmurs
are benign, that may be so statistically. But the ones that are not
benign, in the end, will kill you, inevitably. THe last research I read
gave a mean of around 7 years before death [for people] when the murmur
is no longer benign, unless there is surgical intervention. And most
quacks don't know enough to even begin to figure out which benign
murmur will not be benign in the future. So they throw out meaningless
generalities.

I would ask the human society to pay for the heart surgery if needed.
Do they make little kitty heart valves? That will be one big bill.
Also, I would ask them to look into care. It is possible that a beta
blocker and an ACE inhibitor will buy time when the murmur is no longer
"benign." These drug are not too expensive. A beta blocker is dirt
cheap. I don't know if this is done with felines.