Heart murmur - cat

My 1.5 year old cat has a heart murmur. He’ll have a heart scan in a month to determine what to do next. I believe there are 3 possible outcomes 1. Surgery to correct it 2. Life long medicine 3. Nothing - if it’s mild enough he can live with this Are those options correct? And if they decide to do nothing because it’s mild murmur, what is life expectancy for these cats. Between the surgery and the medicine, I think the surgery is a better option as a one off fix. What is done on this procedure, and what are approximate costs for such surgery, they couldn’t tell me at vet practice at the stage when I only have a heart scan booked (which costs £850).

Hello - I like your approach.  Your cat has a heart murmur and you are immediately trying to locigally sort out the options and prepare for the decisions that you may be faced with when you get the results of the scan. I am not a cardiologist but the first thing I would recommend would be having a chat to one.  At 1.5 years old, I wonder whether the sort of congenital heart murmur that might close on its own would already have done so?  I am also aware that heart murmurs can be a sign of hyperthyroidism and / or hypertension from other causes in some cats.  1.5 years old is very young for a hyperthyroid cat but that can certainly happen at 3 years old.  Furthermore, some murmurs can be connected to the pressure of a stephoscope on the chest and go away again (your vet might well have ruled this out on exam). It is also true that not all cats with a murmur require medication - at least not right away.  Its possible that in some cases the medication comes later, if conditions develop beyond a certain stage - although again, if you are considering a scan then the cardiologist might be the best person to ask about that. I am in no place to tell you what surgery your cat would need as they haven't yet performed the scan showing what the problem with the heart is! - and as you'll appreciate, there is a big difference between different findings.  The heart sound is made when the heart valves shut and the sound of a heart valve shutting can be disturbed for several different reasons. In summary though, it sounds as though things are on the right track.  Although there are a lot of unknowns from where I am sitting, your vets will already have fewer unknowns than me and are getting a scan to find more information so that they can be more precise in discussing their expectations with you. I hope that this helps a little.

Hello again!  Rebecca Martin's article (does my cat have heart disease) is an excellent one and provides an excellent answer to you question.  It can be found in our blog.

Finally I'd like to add that most cats do not end up have heart surgery! - this is relatively unusual in the feline world.

Thank you so much. My cat got his scan and it turns out he does have a heart disease that causes heart murmur grade IV/VI. He has heart enlargement on left side. I am grateful I learnt about his disease quite early because maybe I can slow down the progression of it. He got prescription medicine for blood clots. My cat has always been on a healthy diet (high meat grain free wet food) and I make sure he has exercise daily and I massage him with a brush to help circulation - so I will continue with that, as well I will now introduce some supplements for healthy heart, like taurine and hemp seed oil. I’m hoping that healthy lifestyle, meds and supplements can slow down the progression of the disease and buy him some time. Any tips, recommendations other than I’m already doing are very welcome. What cardiologist wouldn’t tell me is the lifespan of the cats with congenital HCM, what’s the average and what’s the maximum, I wonder if you can tell that.