15/01/2026
Meet gorgeous Belle, who came in to see Luke to investigate a heart murmur identified by her primary care vets.
Belle won us over not just with her winning personality but also because she has a white heart shape on her chest 🥰🫶 Her tail was lost to unknown reason before her current amazing owners took charge of her care 🥺
Belle was diagnosed with stage B2 hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which is where her heart muscle has increased in size and is actually hampering her cardiac function. Belle displayed this beautifully on echo along with her mitral valve inflow pattern being reversed (the orange peaks you can see in the last picture should have a higher wave first and a small wave second, Belle's are the wrong way around).
This demonstrates that her heart muscle isn't relaxing as well as it should meaning her heart doesn't fill with blood as much and her output is then reduced.
Belle has returned home after perusing the scan room and taking advantage of the proffered liquid cat treat with some medication to help reduce the impact of her disease process. We will keep an eye on her in the coming months to assess her rate of progression 🤓❤
