She been posting in rpch+b.

Hugs,

CatNipped

Sorry, I was offline for a few days and just saw this.  Yes, Abbey had
chylothorax 2 years ago and had a very poor prognosis.  Today, she is
doing wonderfully, fat and sassy again.  She had her chest drained 3
times total.  Then she had an ultrasound after that which showed
fibrosing pleuritis (damage to the pleural cavity from having that
fluid in there)--the prognosis for that is not good at all so she was
not expected to live.  I was told they would probably be unable to
drain her again because the fluid was accumulating in little scar
pockets instead of altogether in the chest cavity.  Fortunately, she
never needed to be drained after that.

She had xrays a few months ago and 2/3 of one of her lungs is all scar
tissue but she is still doing fine.  The vet said she may not live a
normal life span (she's 6 now) but she also may since she has beat the
odds so far.  She breathes a little oddly--it looks like she is
pushing the air out in a different way (which she is) but she doesn't
breathe fast at all (that was her initial symptom--fast, labored
breathing) but even that has improved and it's not as noticeable as it
used to be.  I don't think anyone else would notice it but me.

She is on 12.5mg of lasix everyday.  She also developed coughing a few
months ago which may have been because of her lungs/bronchial tubes
being comprised so she was on prednisolone.  However, now she has not
coughed in a couple months.  I don't know if that may be because it is
currently fairly humid in Phoenix instead of the usual dry weather.  I
guess we will see when it dries out if her cough returns.  We keep her
on as low a dose of prednisolone as we can during her coughing.  She
was at 5mg per day during the peak of her coughing and that controlled
it pretty much.

The fluid from chylothorax is sort of milky looking with a slight pink
tinge.  In her case, it was idiopathic, meaning there was never a
cause determined.  We treated her with lasix and rutin, which I read
about.  You can get it in a health food store.  She still takes a
small dose of rutin everyday also.  She never took the megadose
recommended for chylothorax.  There is info about it on the internet.

I had recalled that Dan's Harri had pneumothorax rather than
chylothorax (I thought).  There is a difference that I don't recall at
the moment.  Pneumothorax has a better prognosis than chylothorax.  I
believe the fluid has a different appearance also.  I know of other
cats who also survived chylothorax so it is not impossible.  I think
lasix and rutin might be the key.  Big doses of lasix. It was never
recommended that Abbey have a chest tube.  I know Harri had one.

Good luck to this little kitty.  Have them read about rutin.

Candace