Onderstaand bericht heb ik geschreven voor de website
metacamkills.com, maar helaas doet het emailadres van de eigenaar van de site het niet meer. Ik zie ook dat deze 3 jaar geleden voor het laatst is bijgewerkt. Ongetwijfeld had hij het vuur nog zolang hij zelf boos en verdrietig was over het verlies van zijn kat en is hij er nu niet meer zo intensief mee bezig. Heel begrijpelijk. Ik heb er echter niet voor niets aan gewerkt, dus plaats ik het maar hier:
I'm a Dutch reader of your website and I was shocked by what I read! If only I had known sooner...
On September 1, 2017, we lost our beloved cat Boogie. She made it to the very respectable age of 18,5, about 90 years old in human years. She had to be put down so she wouldn't have to suffer any longer.
On the morning of Saturday, August 26, Boogie vomited violently and then suddenly collapsed to the floor. She was able to stand up, however, and soon after that she had a constant urge to pee everywhere around the house, with little or no result. When she did manage to squeeze out a few drops of urine it contained blood.
Worried, we decided to take her to the vet, who examined her. The first thing he noticed was how skinny Boogie was. After feeling her kidneys he came to a painful conclusion: Boogie's kidneys were in an advanced stage of shrinkage. In other words, her current bladder infection was only symptomic of a chronic kidney condition.
Although he did mention having bloodwork done, he didn't insist and only injected Boogie with Simentra to lower Boogie's blood pressure and Novocam (the European brand name for Metacam) as a pain reliever. In retrospect, I think he already knew this was palliative care at best, but decided not to tell us to allow us time to get used to this harsh reality. We were given Semintra and Novocam (Metacam) to administer to Boogie orally in the following days.
Being health-conscious and extremely skeptical of Big Pharma I had a bad feeling about the Novocam. I was aware of the dangers NSAIDs pose to human health and so the next day we decided to try only the blood pressure medication. It failed to have the desired effect, so the next day we were faced with a difficult choice. Our theory was that Boogie was unable to urinate properly due to pain in her bladder and so we felt that pain medication was the lesser of two evils. That day we administered both drugs to Boogie.
What I'm about to describe next will be all too familiar to everyone reading or contributing to this website:
Within a day, Boogie became lethargic and withdrawn, lost her coordination, showed frequent muscle spasms, was constantly licking her lips, vomited, lost her appetite and eventually stopped purring and drinking and ultimately wanted to be left alone to die.
Five days before, I had ordered an herbal supplement and we were anxiously waiting for it to be delivered. We received it on Wednesday,. That was also the day when I finally did research on these drugs and stumbled upon both this website and the BLACK BOX WARNING issued by the FDA. Needless to say I felt like kicking myself for not researching this earlier!
That day we decided to terminate all synthetic medication and only focus on detoxing this junk out of her system. I had read about cats being put on IV in emergency clinics but decided that even a regular visit to the vet would be too stressful for Boogie, so we did the next best thing: homemade liquid feed consisting of raw wild salmon, coconut oil, Celtic seasalt, apple cider vinegar and CBD oil, the herbal supplement, and even active charcoal (Norit) in water.
I'm convinced that in Boogie's final three days we were able to successfully detox these drugs out of her system. Her urine turned milky and white, a sign of either pus or bladder grit (or both) and she vomited up pitch-black gunk, which stank to high heaven. After that the muscle spasms stopped, she was no longer showing signs of nausea and she became peaceful and tranquil, although fatally weak.
On Friday, we decided to have her euthanized in the comfort of our home. This was a race that was lost even before we started it. In the end, despite all of our best efforts, Boogie couldn't walk anymore without collapsing. Her time was simply up, she was wasting away and we wished for her to pass while she still had some dignity left. It was a relief to see her without pain or suffering, although we are still grieving from the loss and feel almost amputated after having her bright, loving spirit fill up our home for 18 wonderful years.
In all fairness I should mention that only two months prior Boogie experienced something similar - first she collapsed, then she couldn't pee. At the time, my girlfriend didn't want to take her to the vet and said that if this was her time she should die at home. But after just one day, Boogie miraculously recovered and graced us with her presence for two more months. In other words, Boogie was living on borrowed time and we bear no ill will or grudge toward the vet that gave her the Novocam/Metacam. I know now that even if we had never taken her to the vet she wouldn't have made it to 2018 just the same.
Bear in mind that in all of her 18 years on this planet she had received vaccinations only during her first 4 years and for the next 14 years she had NEVER seen a vet! It's only realistic to conclude that Boogie did in fact have underlying kidney issues, which were in an advanced stage, but other than that she had experienced ZERO health problems, not even fleas! 18 years of good health and spirit clearly outweigh 6 days of suffering and I take comfort in the thought that she left this earth clear of any poisons she had in her system.
I did email the veterinary practice about the FDA warning yesterday and have not had a response yet. To my knowledge, Dutch vets are unaware of this official warning and I can only hope they will take it to heart in order to prevent other cats and owners from going through the same terrible ordeal. Yes, Metacam kills, but Boogie's kidneys were already severely weakened, so we may have even saved her from more chronic and painful complaints. RIP, Boogie, see you on the other side!
Mike
