Above is our sweet, Pitten aka “Tonk”. The first image is what she looked like when she first arrived. She and her mom were displaced after a house fire. She was just a kitten. The Second and third images are of her today. She has been spayed and is currently up to date on all her vaccines. Pitten is with an exceptional foster family and has someone home with her all the time.
She is considered special needs. She has an estimated birthday of 8-8-2023. She was born with a rare condition. She has severely deformed back legs. Currently, she can move around and climb. She has adapted well, climbs stairs, and uses a litter box. Her doctors think she is a Maine Coon mix and looks like she will be a large cat when she is an adult. This can add complications to her legs, hips, and mobility. Monitoring her diet & weight will be very important for her entire life.
Her first visit with an orthopedic specialist was in January. We were advised that this happened to her while developing in her mother. Her deformity is due to soft tissue, not bone. This makes her condition a little more difficult to handle. She is too young to do any heroics for her while she’s still growing and her body is developing. Her specialist wants to see her at roughly 1 year of age to determine if surgery is needed. If so, this would be very costly.
The estimates given to our rescue roughly were:
$1,740 – CAT scan that can only be done at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore is $10,000 to fuse joints in her back legs to prevent arthritis as she ages. (est, $5,000 per leg) – Dr. prefers to do both at the same time. Her specialist is at Nexus Veterinary in Baltimore, MD. ( Dr. Dycus) Since her condition is rare, she will need to continue her care at this hospital, including Johns Hopkins for scans.
We are not sure at what age this would need to be performed, if at all. At a minimum, it would be the CAT scan as she ages to see how tissue develops as she matures. We assume this may need to be repeated throughout her life.