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After a trip to the Vet on Friday afternoon, Nick was disagnosed with feline hip dysplasia. So we know what was causing his aggressive outbursts, and can now treat his condition. We choose a vet/hospital that specializes just in cats, which I would recommend to everyone who is a cat fancier. I called two different previous vets to discuss Nick's condition and both of them treated us as if we were imagining or exaggerating Nick's behavior change. However, the new Vet spent almost an hour with us discussing Nick's exact behavior, history etc, asked great questions and in general listened to our concerns. He suspected based on our description of Nicks behavior that it sounded similar to what dog's experience with hip dysplasia. He said he knew that dog's were prone to display very aggressive behavior as a result of the pain from hip dysplasia, and that it would happen at anytime, therefore making it nearly impossible for the owner to track any sort of behavior pattern. This led him to do an xray and there it was, Nick has hip dysplasia.

The Vet put him on a course of some kind of mild morphine (is there such a thing?:-) and Nick is doing beautifully. He is back to his old self, although there is still a bit of latant fear--occasionally when we startle him he will hiss at us but nothing like before. We are going to do the pain killers for 10 days, check his progress and then either go to long-term arthitis care, or even perhaps surgery to repair his damaged hip. Our Vet said they can remove the damaged hip joint, and that cats compensate beautifully; he will be able to run, jump etc after about a 3 week recovery period. So we will see if that is necessary.

Thank you so much for your suggestions and support. Now that I am better educated and understand his behavior/symptoms I wanted to share my experience with others. If I had thought for one second it was a medical condition and not a behavior condition I would have taken him the vet immediately and not let him be in pain for over 2 weeks. I guess we assumed since we just moved that he was having trouble adjusting; he had just been to the vet (different one than the current one) the week before we moved so we had no inclination that it could be something physically wrong with him. Anyway, I will keep you updated on his progress. Thanks again!

Hi All, I just wanted to revisit and update you on Nicks condition since you all have been so so supportive and helpful. Well, it turns out that we took Nick to no less than 3 Orthopedic surgeons, all of whom said Nicks hip dysplasia was absolutely not bad enough to be causing these aggressive outbursts. One of them put him on Medicam, an anti-inflammatory, which we think upset his sensitive stomach so badly that he actually stopped drinking and would up in the hospital in full renal failure! :-(

He stayed at Tufts in Grafton, MA in early February and had 4 days worth of tests run to determine the cause of his lower body pain. He has ultrasounds, xrays, MRIs, blood work etc. He was seen by Internists, Orthos and Neurologists. We finally had to bring him home after 4 days so he could recouperate from his time at the hospital! Every vet agreed that upon examination, he was fine in his upper body, and as soon as they examined near his hips and tail he went nuts and attacked them as well. Since he came home from the hospital he has attacked at least every other day, sometimes several times in one day. Often it can just be stalking, growling and hissing, but somedays he will have a full blown episode and come after us.

So, we went to a Behaviorist associated with Tufts this time as lieterally a "last chance." I had to beg his secretary for an emergency appointment, but we brought Nick in to see him last week. Boy, did the behaviorist we brought in last time have it wrong wrong wrong! Dr. Dodman was able to pinpoint Nicks condition in literally 5 minutes. He has Feline Hyperesthesia Syndrome. I did so much research prior to this diagnosis and had never come across this before. Anyway, it has some connection to partial seizures in the brain and often presents as unprovoked aggression, petting induced aggression, or the Jeckle and Hyde psycho kitty description. Cats may have very subtle signs (like Nick) that I missed as just general cat behavior, tail twitching often, or excessive tail grooming (we always just thought Nick was clean!) Nick would get a glazed far away look sometimes and be inconsolible, which we now know to be him having the partial seizure.

Anyway, I just wanted to share this information with this board. You are all so supportive and helpful and I know this is a pretty rare disease, but the consequences of missing the diagnosis are grim. The aggression associated with it is sometimes so bad (like Nick), that if it isn't treated the unfortunately afflicted cat is usually put down. If you aren't familiar with Dr. Dodman and the PetFax program, please take a peek. Dr. Alice Moon-Fannelli works there as well and I have nothing but good things to say about her as well. She is also overseeing Nicks treatment. Between the two of them, they are very confident we can get Nicks condition under control.

Here is the info on Petfax www.tufts.edu/vet/petfax/

and here is info on FHS

www.petplace.com/articles...artID=1991

Thank you again for all your help and support!

Jen

Yes, thank you for the Dr. Dodman recommendation. We took Nick to 3 different vet hospitals in the Boston area over the past 5 months and they all would just scratch their heads and say, well we don't know whats wrong with him, you should take him to Dr. Dodman! His name just kept coming up even amongst his peers. We're lucky that we live within 30 minutes of Tufts in Grafton, MA. In his newest book "If Only They Could Speak," read the chapter about Arlene and Seth. It is a very similar case to mine, and according to Dr. Dodman, the cat is to this day doing well on medication with no further aggression.

He is really busy but a likeable man who definitely shares our concerns for our pets, esp. cats. (Some of the Orthos we saw primarily worked on dogs). His staff is just super. Like I said, I read everything I could find on hip dysplasia, and what bothered me about that was that none of the symptoms were ever listed as pain-induced aggression. I searched and searched and searched and didn't even know hyperesthesia existed until after the diagnosis. After the diagnosis was made however, it seemed to make sense and matched up even with the really odd behavior Nick had been exhibiting.

According to Dr. Dodman, (I could be butchering this--I'm not a neurologist!) the same area in the cats brain controls grooming, predatory tendancies and fear and/or aggression. When the seizure hits, thats why several of this odd combination of behaviors are exhibited. That is why a lot cats afflicted with this pay special attention to grooming their hip, back paw and tail area...some even to the point that they lick the all the hair off. Nick wasn't that bad with the grooming; he had much worse aggression. But it does explain why for no reason, he would just rarely just attack, he would usually start to stalk us first, as if we were strangers in his territory, and then attack. Then sometimes after an attack, he would crawl under the table, sit and just stare right through me. He wouldn't attack...just sit and stare blankly. Truly bizarre. But now it makes sense--it seems he was having a partial seizure. Some vets do not believe in the coorelation between hyperesthesia and partial seizures since it is a new theory I guess. Too bad I don't have all Nick's symptoms in sequence on video or they might just change their mind!

Anyway, keep an eye out for these behaviors in other postings, as I will as well. Thanks again! Jen