15 year old Cats Hematoma

Hello, I’m just looking for more honest advice! I have taken my cat to the vets 2 times for his Aural Hematoma. For some background, he is 15 years old, slightly under 7.5lbs, he has early kidney disease, has had a senior panel done that shows a 95% chance of developing chronic Kidney disease in the next 12-24 months. He developed this just shy of 2 weeks ago, I took him in 10 days ago, we started prednisone but that didn’t seem to be helping much, it hasn’t gone down at all during this time either, seems to have gotten bigger. It’s definitely bothering him, he’s not the same cat he was before this. I was quoted $825-1200 for surgery, which we can not do at this time, having already had to spend over $5,000 on one of our dogs earlier this year (who we ultimately lost.) so now we are trying an ear drop with steroids add and a pill to take once daily. His vet said if this works, I should know by Sunday and if not they saved me a spot to have him go under anesthesia and try to drain it, mainly to help clear up what smells like a bacterial infection in that ear. I guess what I really want to hear from someone is what would you do or recommend at a cat this age, I hate thinking about the “ultimate” decision, I’ve had him since he was a kitten.

Hello!  An aural heamatoma isn't usually fatal but ear disease related to a cauliflower ear (haematoma when untreated) can be very uncomfortable and greatly threaten quality of life.   Good questions for your vet include: what are the possible ways of dealing with this?  What is likely to happen next?  If you had a budget of X what would you recommend?  I hope that this will open up a good conversation appropriate to your patient.  I am not skirting the issue here, but rather the best vet to ask is the one who knows the ins and outs for your cat.  Best of luck and please do let me know how you get on.