t has been several years since I have posted to these two newsgroups but I
have continued to lurk on and off. My one 6 year old kitty after a full panel
had a full panel down last Thursday and I received the results on Friday.

All values were normal except Calcium at 14.4 mg/dL and phosphorus 2.94 mg/dL.
Albumen was slightly high at 40 g/L (she was a bit dehydrated due to diarrhoea
(more about this later). Urinalysis was almost all normal except for the
presence of a few oxalate crystals. Bun Creatinine, Alt, etc all fine as stated
above. However his T4 was close to the maximum of the high range 3.11 ug/dL

The history of the cat is a follows. He was a rescue 5 years ago when he turned
up at my place with a fractured pelvis (I used to only see him once a week when
he would come for a late night stack). After 4-6 weeks of rehabilitation in the
hospital he came out in relatively good shape but due to probably neural damage
he had problems defectating and could not urinate on his own.

The defecation problem was largely solved with Lactulose, cisapride (which I
got him off after about 3 months of being home) and a blend of psyllium
(primarily soluble fibre) and wheat bran (primarily insoluble).

This has generally worked very well for 5 years until a month ago when he did
not seem to be doing so well with the constipation. A vet visit then and we
discussed putting him back on the cisapride and also trying ranitidine in
conjunction firstly with the fibre and then trying a low residue diet.
Cisapride and ranitidine worked not that great and last week the full panel was
done with figures mentioned above.

Now to the hypercalcemia and the slight hypophosphatemea.

I have done a lot of research on this. The most popular one cited is:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi
cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=10772491

This was a retrospective study of 71 cats and the most common diagnoses were
neoplasia 21 cats), renal disease (not applicable here)- 18 cats urolithiasis
and lastly in 4 cases there was hyperparathyroidism. 20 of the cats apparently
were deemed to suffer from idiopatic hypercalcemia.

Other studies I have looked at are here and these often referenced the above:

WSAVA 2001 congress:

http://www.vin.com/VINDBPub/SearchPB/Proceedings/PR05000/PR00123.htm

(Hypercalcemia in cats - Dennis Chew)

WSAVA 2002 congress

(Hypercalcemia in dogs and cats Etiology and Diagnostic Approach - Richard
Nelson - University of California Davis)

http://www.vin.com/proceedings/Proceedings.plx?CID=WSAVA2002&PID=2555&Category=
429

I have looked at various other full text and abstracts and I have been
hoping/dreaming that it is either transient hypercalcemia (which I don't think
due to the presence of the calcium oxalate crystals) or laboratory error (once
again not hoping much there). My main hope is that is primary
hyperparathyroidism as discussed here:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?
cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=1813472

(Primary hyperparathyroidism in cats: seven cases (1984-1989).

Assuming it is persistent hypercalcemia it might be idiopathic (but prognosis
there is somewhat mixed)but propably some cancer, be it lymphoma or otherwise.

Tomorrow the boy is going in for an ionised calcium test and a PTH test (the
lab does not do PTHrp tests yet). I will also have a vitamin D test and another
retest of total calcium (another retest was done on Saturday). Depending on
results this will be followed up by full X-Rays and ultrasound.

So I don't really know what to say. I am massively concerned about it being a
malignant neoplasia and I suppose I will soon know.

Peter