Jimmy's owners brought him to see me because they noticed he was walking uncomfortably and they could see that one of his claws was growing into his pad.

He was 16 years old, a short-haired tabby cat who had been handsome once but was now looking decidedly dishevelled with his matted coat and sore feet.

His owner lifted him up while I examined his feet. All his claws were overgrown and two had started to actually curl round and grow into his pads. I carefully clipped his nails and cleaned the small wounds they had left in his pads.

It was four years since Jimmy had been to the surgery so I suggested it was also time for a check-over. It turned out that he seemed to have been passing more urine recently in his litter tray. It was difficult to tell if he had also been drinking more than usual because of his habit of drinking out of the fish pond but probably he had.

He had stopped grooming himself properly and although his owner had tried to groom him they had only been partially successful and there was still a lot of matted hair in his coat. When I opened his mouth I found that many of his teeth were missing, and the ones he still had were covered in huge lumps of tartar. I was able to remove the worst of these even without an anaesthetic without hurting him.

Nearly one in six cats over the age of 15 has kidneys that no longer get rid of waste products properly and I strongly suspected that this was the cause of most of Jimmy's problems. I suggested this to his owners and asked if I could take a blood and urine sample from him.

The next day I collected the samples and groomed his coat, then I saw his owners to discuss the results. As I suspected Jimmy had chronic renal failure. That meant that he passed large amounts of dilute watery urine but his kidneys still could not get rid of all the waste products they ought to. There was also too much phosphorus and too little potassium in his bloodstream.

The sample of his urine showed that he also had an infection in his kidneys and bladder. I explained that any infection in his kidneys would soon cause more damage so I put him on antibiotic tablets twice a day for a month and arranged for his owners to put him on to a special low-protein low phosphorus diet to help compensate for his kidney problems. I also prescribed him a special supplement to increase the potassium in his bloodstream. Lack of potassium causes muscular weakness which would make him inactive and stop him grooming himself.

A month later when I saw Jimmy for another check-up he was considerably happier and was accepting his new diet well. His kidneys were still not working normally but he is still alive and the treatment has certainly improved the quality of his life.

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