Carolyn and DD, thanks for the tips. I am leaving this morning to go up and spend the rest of the week and see what all I can do to comfort and assist my sister. I will definitely share your suggestions with her. So far they have been doing her chemo through an IV, they said they will do a port if needed. We have talked every day, and so far all she has requested are some new clothes (she's lost a tremendous amount of weight) and to shop for some rose bushes to plant, and to polish her toenails! (I wondered about her going to a salon and having a pedicure, but worry about possible infection? She was going to check with her radiation/chemo folks.) Thank you all.

No help with Iowa facility, but some questions and a request for updates. I too have a 15 year old hyperthyroid kitty. Memphis takes tapazole twice daily to keep her thyroid in check. She's been diagnosed and taking it for over a year. I looked into the radiation. But the isolation at the facility (in CA by law that's 10 days) and even after the 10 days, I'd be required to lock her in a bathroom and only see her a total of 30 minutes a day to feed and clean litter box for 2 more weeks. Memphis is totally bonded to me. Not only does she follow me everwhere she sits on me immediately, snuggles under the covers when I sleep to sleep next to me. She gets majorily depresssed if I'm gone on vacation or business trip and she hates the vet. She had surgery about 7 years ago when she broke her jaw in 3 places. (Still a mystery as she's a total indoor only cat and it happened in the middle of the night while I was asleep). When she woke she tried to claw her way out of the cage at the vets and they had a really hard time trying to keep her from harming herself. So I still buy the tapazole. My vet says that it will keep the thyroidism in check, and we do blood tests every 6 months to make sure Liver and Kidneys stay healthy. This costs money as well. I still wonder about the radiation. If you find a place, can you keep us updated about your cat's treatment and recovery? Especially if her behavior changes or doesn't change once she's completed treatment.

Wow, that really stinks. I totally guessed he had a different problem, but being hyperthyroid is better than my guess (which was cancer). It's really rare for a cat to need a second I131 treatment, but then again it's really rare for such a young cat to become hyperT4. I suspect most older cats die of something else before having a chance to become hyperT4 again. I did a quick google scholar search and couldn't find anything about stats for younger cats and recurrence of hyperthyroidism. I did find a reference for an 8 month old hyperthyroid cat, and during my time as a tech for RadCats we treated an 18 month old cat. But nothing was written in the literature about long-term follow up for the young cat, except her became hypothyroid after treatment. And I don't know about the young guy we treated except he made it through fine and had a normal T4 the following year. As far as why he's hyperT4 again, he just grew another thyroid tumor, either a benign adenoma or a malignant carcinoma. The I131 destroys all active thyroid tissue, which in theory, is all the diseased thyroid tissue (benign or malignant, doesn't matter). However it cannot destroy *future* tumors. As far as why cats become hyperthyroid to begin with, most if the research now is focusing on environmental and food toxins. There was some research into an autoimmune problem, and some about a genetic reason, but most likely the cause is multfactorial. I went to a talk about hyperthyroidism in cats while in school, and from what I remember, she was talking about metals in fish and canning materials that suppressed thyroid tissue long-term and basically wreaked havoc on the autoregulation of thyroid hormone, eventually resulting in hyperthyroidism. The research is still on-going, and unfortunately it's hard to get grant money for it because 1) cats in general don't earn as much research money as dogs and 2) hyperthyroidism can be managed relatively easily. Here's an abstract from the AVMA journal that says cats who eat fish or giblets foods tend to be hyperT4 more than control cats: http://avmajournals.avma.org/doi/abs/10.2460/javma.2000.217.853 Here's a review article about hyperthyroidism http://ecommons.library.cornell.edu/bitstream/1813/11446/1/2006%20Lynn.pdf As mentioned before, methimazole can be used to suppress thyroid hormone, as long as your cat doesn't have a reaction to the medication. It's available for oral and transdermal administration. So not being able to do a 3rd I131 treatment doesn't mean your cat can't be treated. I couldn't find any specific studies done on the effect of radioactive I131 in cats. I know that having treated cats for many years, and being exposed to several doses every week, I never was even close to legal radiation limits. Of course I also never injected myself with it either! I linked a general article on I131 below; it has some references. You can also google beta particles and gamma rays for information on the type of radiation I131 produces. Only the beta particles stay in the cat, and they only penetrate up to 5mm tissue. I found another abstract regarding survival times. On the good side, cats treated with I131 live longer than cats treated with methimazole. On the bad side, the younger the cat is, the more quickly it died regardless of treatment. http://avmajournals.avma.org/doi/abs/10.2460/javma.228.4.559 Of course cats with pre-existing renal disease didn't fare too well no matter what treatment was used. I hope Basil beats the odds and has a long happy euthyroid life after this treatment.

Yay, Patti!!! Congrats on your graduation and I really hope you start feeling a lot better soon, just not having to go in once or twice a day ought to be great for your rest and stamina! I hope Harry is feeling better soon, too, and that the 2 of you have a great upcoming fall and winter season! Thanks for the update and it's wonderful to see you!