This month’s Brave Cat is Zeus, he is a 5 month old GORGEOUS British Blue. He has been in recently as is owner noticed some breathing problems. He was happy and well in himself but his breathing was very loud particularly when he was asleep, he was not in any distress and was very happy in himself running around causing all manner of trouble! Dr Jeremy gave him a full health check, examining his mouth and chest and abdomen. The noise seemed to originate from his upper respiratory tract (nose, throat and vocal cords) and given that Zeus was only young and not in any discomfort we opted to wait and see if this was something he might grow out of and the breathing would improve.
Over the next few weeks his breathing seemed to get worse, he was still very lively and happy in himself but he sounded like he was gagging particularly when eating and drinking and had a worrying attack where he seemed to wretch and be unable to breath. At this point we decided to do some investigative work to find out what has been going on.
Zeus came in to us for the day and under a general anaesthetic we examined the back of the throat and the nasal cavity with a rigid and flexible fibre-optic endoscope. We watched the movement of his larynx, epiglottis and soft palate (fleshy part of the roof of the mouth at the back) and what we found was that the soft palate was very long (elongated) and this was interfering with the normal movement of the larynx and epiglottis causing the clinical signs. We were able to take some photos (See photo attached) of this condition.
The surgery to correct this was performed and the soft palate was trimmed back to a more normal length.
Zeus has bounced back so quickly and was such a joy to have in with us.
Well done Zeus!!!!!