I am a retired physician and I waited 3 months after our cat's death to write this so I could do it in a balanced way. Dr Amber Herron missed the diagnosis of primary hypertension in our elderly cat with the result that she went entirely blind. By the time Dr Herron did take a blood pressure, after I insisted that going blind and losing 20% of her weight was not normal aging she was in hypertensive crisis with blood pressure of 278/154. She had a hemorrage visible in one eye. I do not recommend anyone see her. We were away for 6 wks last year and had a cat sitter stay with our 16 yo tuxedo cat at our home. She was dramatically different when we returned. She had lost weight and seemed to not see as well as she had. In the middle of the night she would yowl very loudy. We took her in. Dr Amber Heron said she was getting old, and failing. She did an exam, but it did not include a blood pressure. 2 months later she was blind, running into walls. She no longer jumped up on our bed. She could not retract her claws. She had lost 22% of her weight in 8 months and was now 7.4 lbs despite seeming ravenously hungry. Her food bowl was always empty and she ate the extra food we gave her quickly if we sat with her while she ate. Now we think our other cat was eating her automatically dispensed food. We took her in again. They did over $200 of blood work on a Wednesday morning that showed she was not hyperthyroid, and her kidney function was fairly good for her age. We didn't get a call back about the results of the blood work. We were there the following day, Thursday, with our dog to get a vaccination and asked for the results. They initially refused because our vet wasn't there that day, but when we insisted another vet came out and gave us the results and said they looked pretty normal and that our vet would call us the following day(Friday). She did not, though she was in the office. I called and left a message. I was told they left a message that I wanted a call back on her message board so she would see it. Saturday morning I called and made it clear I expected a call back that day as it had been 4 days since we saw her and had not heard from her. She called back and said she had left a message(no message was left). Then she said the labs looked good and she was just aging. I told her that going blind was not normal aging. Why did she think she had gone blind? She said that my cat's eyes were responsive to light and she had a menace response. I interrupted her and reminded her that I sat right there when she waived her hand at Betsy who didn't flinch or move at all and heard her say, Hmm no menace response, and that her eyes appeared to me to be fixed and dilated. Then she said oh she did remember our telling her the cat was 'functionally blind' but that she had a normal blood pressure. I asked what that was. She couldn't find the number but said she was sure she had taken it. She said to bring her in and they would do a blood pressure at no cost to us. We did. It was 280/148 and on repeat 254/176. Normal in cats, like people is 120/80. She admitted the eyes were not reactive to light like they should be, and said there was a hemorrhage in one eye. She did not have cataracts. Uncontrolled hypertension can cause eye hemorrhages, blindness and severe headaches. Her blood pressure was in hypertensive crisis range. Most common cause of that in cats in hyperthyroidism or severe kidney disease, neither of which she had. Dr Heron told us she probably had pheochromacytoma, a tumor of the adrenal glands, and put that in her medical record though it was never formally diagnosed by MRI. I looked it up. Only a few cases of pheochromocytoma have been reported in the literature. Primary hypertension(no known underlying cause) occurs in 20 % of cats with hypertension. It appears to me that Dr Heron was covering up having missed the diagnosis of primary hypertension. If she had taken a blood pressure when our cat had started losing weight and yowling in the middle of the night our cat would probably never have gone completely blind. Her blood pressure responded to the medications given, but Betsy never adapted to being blind. She sat in one place except to use the litter box. If we did not bring her food she didn't eat. She ran into walls. After 6 wks with no improvement we let her go. IF you have an elderly cat, demand they take a blood pressure as part of their yearly exam and don't leave until you record in your records what the blood pressure is. We took all of our animals out of their care. At our next vet we discovered there is a vaccination for dogs for leptospirosis that is considered to be part of core vaccine recommendations for dogs that had never been mentioned at Caring Hands. read more
