‘I feel we have been rinsed of money and our young cat has died as a result of a sheer lack of concern’

mentioned to you, you were not made to feel they were urgent, or that your cat was seriously ill. In fact you vehemently deny that any kind of timeline was discussed and have accused the surgery of retrospectively changing its notes to support its defence.

In his letter to you, the vet also raised concerns about your cat’s weight, which the surgery has recorded as being 10kg (22lb), rendering him clinically obese. The vet said you blamed this on your cat “having a lot of human food” when it was raised in a consultation. You say you never said this, and the extent of your cat’s human food consumption is that he sometimes eats bits off the floor. The vet says he advised against feeding him human food, describing the dangers that this could lead to in cats, including certain deficiencies, namely that of taurine, which can cause a dilated heart. You say you don’t recall any such conversation.

The last time you brought your cat to the vet alive, on July 20, he was sneezing with a productive clear discharge from his nose, the vet said. He has retrospectively suggested that this reflected fluid could have been from congestive heart failure, which happens to be one of the consequences of a dilated heart. You say, however, that this connection between the physical symptom of nasal discharge and potential diagnosis was never mentioned in the consultation. Meanwhile, I was baffled by the discrepancy over the day on which your cat died. The vet’s letter clearly stated that your cat died the day after the consultation, on July 21. However, you were adamant it was on July 20, around two hours after his appointment. This felt like a very impor