Day 30: Upper Respiratory Infections

                Today was another day where not too much happened, besides mostly simple checkups and some Tech appointments.   I spent about half of the morning in the isolation room (stray cat ward), cleaning out each cage and giving all the cats new blankets, litter, water, and food.  During the earlier period of my cleaning, I was cleaning the cage of three kittens that had come in a few weeks ago, and I noticed one of the kittens was continuously sitting in the corner of the cage, even when I would scoop her up and place her out of the cage so she could run around the room and play with her siblings while I cleaned (she kept moving back into the cage).  I noticed she had her head down as well, so I scooped her up again and lifted her head; she had all sorts of goop around and coming out of her eyes (she could also barely open her eyes), she had a lot of yellow congestion coming out of her nose, and she seemed to have a fever as well.  I knew right away that she had a bad upper respiratory infection based on these symptoms. These three kittens had come in with upper respiratory infections, but this kitten had an infection worse than her two siblings; they all received ten days of Doxycycline., and since she has an infection that is even worse than the one she had a few weeks ago, I narrowed it down to either she didn’t fully recover from the infection she had before, or she either has a weak immune system or something is wrong with her immune system.  I took her out into the main area and showed her to Pat, and asked her what medication I should give the kitten.  Pat told me to squeeze some Terramycin (medication placed in the eyes that fights off bacterial infections, as such) into her eyes for now, and more medication would most likely be added later when a doctor or another tech was able to take a look at her.  I took her back to the isolation room and placed some Terramycin in her eyes, and since we had an unused cage at the time, I set her up a place in that cage away from her siblings (a] to try and prevent her siblings from getting the infection [even though they had already been exposed and therefore there is a possibility they would get it], and b] so she wouldn’t be bothered by her siblings and get some rest).  I gave her food, water, a litter box, and some extra blankets, and as soon as I placed her in the cage she curled up in her litter box and went to sleep.  I placed a blanket over her so she would stay warm, and let her be so she could get some rest.  I checked on her periodically throughout the day, giving her more medicine, wiping the goop and congestion out of her eyes and nose, and if I found her awake I gently stroked her head until she fell back asleep, though that usually didn’t take long; a couple of minutes at most.  The poor thing was exhausted.  I hope that she will be feeling a lot better when I can see her again on Monday.

The poor sick kitten.  This was taken right after I had wiped her eyes and nose, though some more goop and congestion is already starting coming out of her eyes and nose again.  She looked at the camera for a moment, and then curled up and went right back to sleep, poor thing.