Purnest Hemingway

About the Campaign

This poor kitty cannot breathe

Purnest Hemingway (named for the famous author) has a serious birth defect, Congenital Peritoneopericardial Diaphragmatic Hernia (click here for info). In short, his heart and liver push up on his esophagus, basically choking him!

This condition in cats is a birth defect, but often doesn’t become noticeable until they get older. That is what happened in Purnest’s case. His owner has had him since he was a kitten of 8 weeks. Jacqueline rescued him from the Baldwin Park animal shelter east of Los Angeles six years ago. He wasn’t getting any adoption interest, because he had a sort of weird look, what do you think? Here he is as a kitten:

For the next years Purnest was perfectly healthy. He went to the vet for check ups and vaccines. No one noticed a thing. But, he did occasionally cough, but nothing big. And cat’s cough. They get hairballs. No one suspected anything. But near the end of 2021 he started coughing and gagging a lot.

It quickly increased, and Jacqueline took him to the vet. They did x-rays. At first it looked like he had an enlarged heart. But the doctor did more research and examination, and the next day called: Purnest had PPDH.

Purnest is tired, and getting worse:

The basic problem is that this condition will only get worse, and eventually Purnest will literally choke to death. The surgery to repair the problem has a very high success rate, but it requires a specialist and is expensive.

Financial situation

Jacqueline is a teacher, and has some high expenses due to her husband’s disability. She also rescues cats and dogs, and that costs money as well. She has been able to pay for Purnest’s exams so far, just the consultation with the specialist costs $175, plus the cost for x-rays and tests!

Purnest and family:

All donations are paid only to the clinic when the surgery is performed, and if the surgery is not done, donations are refunded. Can you help Mr. Purnest Hemingway today?

Vet estimate (click to enlarge):

Full estimate as PDF: Purnest_vet_doc_full