A member of the public recently found a stray female cat wandering around somewhat distressed in the car park of The Harvester restaurant in Plympton, she took her home and called us for help. As luck would have it a space had become available the day before and we were able to bring "Rosie" straight into our care. On initial investigation it seemed that she was a very friendly, (about 9 yrs old) female. She was somewhat underweight with a worryingly lack of bulk and lustre in her coat, which is often a sign of illness.

 

Rosie moved into her CP pen and after overcoming her initial shyness became confident with Liz her care giver. After a few days, however, Liz noticed her appetite wane and Rosie seem generally unwell. She was taken to the vets for some blood tests, which confirmed a thyroid problem and Rosie started a medication regime. Over a couple of days things stabilized briefly until Rosie went off her food and became very weak. She was immediately hospitalised and later collapsed, so the decision was made to put her to sleep. She had begun the downward slope of internal organ failure and would never have recovered. It was a very emotional time for both Liz and the veterinary staff involved. We believe Rosie had been dumped  by her owner knowing that she had a problem, which is such a shame, since had we known her history earlier, we might have been able to save her life and the heartache it caused us all and especially her fosterer when she had to be put to sleep.  

Testing cats like Rosie for serious illnesses is expensive and lessens the effectiveness of our funds to help other cats in need, whilst we will always provide our cats with whatever veterinary care they may need this illustrates why we need to ask you to continue to support us by way of donations. Please ask as many people as you can to donate whatever they can afford to Plymouth & South Hams Cats Protection. Cats like Rosie need us when there’s no one else that cares.