He is a hot mess.

He has a heart issue, elevated liver enzymes, and his T4 is a 15. We started the methimazole on Friday, sat down with his vet today, and he’ll be back at the vet next week to draw blood, check his levels, and adjust his methimazole.

Am I even spelling that right?

With a number of 15, it may be thyroid cancer. With his cardiac numbers as high as they are, he may not be a candidate for I-131, which is a radioactive iodine injection. If his liver numbers don’t go down, we have to look at it for tumors.

If, may, may not… We wait. We run the drills and start at the bottom, and work our way up, and we wait.

If all numbers normalize, we pursue I-131. If thyroid doesn’t normalize, we pursue I-131. If he has thyroid cancer, and only thyroid cancer, the I-131 is the best option because if he has cancer and it spreads, the thyroid will absorb and process the iodine, regardless of where that tissue has traveled.

If cardiac does not normalize, but liver improves, then the last thing we do is an EKG to either rule him out or qualify him for the I-131. It’s something about the way the heart will perform after therapy, and heart disease can speed up? I am not a magician/physician.

Then again, even if his cardiac values lower, they are so high right now that he may end up living with an enlarged heart. We’re at the bottom though, and not even at viewing the heart yet. There is no point while we’re waiting to see how well this oral medication is working.

This is probably better suited to put in one of those diagrams that predicts outcomes. The next part I can’t wrap my head around is that if he has cancer, and we don’t get him the optimal and most effective treatment before June, how is this going to effect his mortality rate?

Currently, he is upset eating his usual food. He has associated this with bad things. It’s close to him getting medications, close to him getting PetzLife oral gel swabbed on his teeth (he can’t have his dental worked on in his condition), and he concluded yesterday that if he has to eat his routine food, it’s going to bite him in the ass. I told his daddy that ‘I don’t really care if he has to start eating the cans in the pantry; Just keep me abreast of inventory’.

I should see if there is anything to my benefit in my Cornell book on cats. Dismal is going to look up info on studies concluded and outcomes in similarity to Tom.