head trauma

[georg403]

my cat was hit by a car new year eve. we rushed her to vets and they very brilliantly saved her. She suffered a torn lung and was hit on her head while not suffering any fractures or breaks! She had some skin  taken off on her head which is healling nicely and her ear was alittle torn.  Her lung apparently is healing too,vets happy with breathing. We bought her home and are taking great care of her. She is walking around slowly,eating.toileting and is seeing,hearing attentive etc,although she has a long way to go!  What i am wanting to know is it likely that she could improve even more?  For instance she has made no attempt to clean herself, which is something that cats are particular about.i know it early days but if there are any similar stories where cats have made recoveries i would  love to know.  Even though she could have some quality of life i would so like to see it much better.x

[Whtroze]

its sounds like she is doing so good already...she is definately a fighter. As for her not grooming herself, don't worry too much about that. She may still have some soreness and even maybe not feel all that great yet. Kitties, although usually are very particular about grooming, do tend to slack on grooming when they don't feel well or are hurting (even just a little). It appears by your description she doesn't really have any permanent damage that is noticed...so full recovery is very likely, it just takes time.
Even if there is some damage that she can't fully recover, animals are wonderful at adjusting to a "disability"...so much better than people. For example, when my 16 year old kitty was about 2 years old he was a stray that got hit by a car. He was pretty scraped up and his back leg was terribly mutilated. He also was full of just about any internal intestinal parasite you could think of. He was taken in off the streets, treated for the parasites, and ended up having the leg amputated. Recovery took time, but he healed and adjusted to the leg amputation amazingly. In fact there wasn't anything he couldn't do that the other 3 kitties with 4 legs in the house couldn't do. He survived another 14 years happily and crazy as a kitten.

[opus88]

I am so sorry to read about what happened to your dear kitty. of course there is lots of hope...we've had many kitties come back from the brink of death and recover, with perhaps some limitations but able to function...
I will send a link to one old post in our archives(find this by clicking on 'abt this forum link on top of screen)
this kitty recuperated well beyond what was expected, and there are other similar stories. it takes time and tons of patience....luck to you both♥

http://www.medhelp.org/posts/Cats/blindness-due-to-blow-or-injury/show/1338047?personal_page_id=1770406#post_6129317

this article also gives good info

http://veterinarycalendar.dvm360.com/avhc/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=675298&pageID=1&sk=&date=