:nod: Of course I understand. I sure hope they have them!
I do so much shopping on Amazon, I'm a "Prime" member, so even overnight stuff is $3.
I do so much shopping on Amazon, I'm a "Prime" member, so even overnight stuff is $3.
I agree. I've been trying to get him off dry food, but every time I make some kind of progress, he tanks again and I have to give him whatever he will eat. The good news (kind of) is that after we got home from the vet (which was not until noon and I was super late for work), I put down a tablespoon of the RC Rabbit dry and he ate it all.To stabilize him, I see absolutely no reason not to do this. I personally would try to skip the dry food altogether. But he needs to eat. I mean - there's definitely a point where that he eats is more important than what he eats.
Of course, given that he liked the S&C rabbit, I'd contact the company (they have great customer service) to ask about the possibility of other proteins in minute amounts being in their rabbit formula.
Oh, I forgot that! The vet did say that diabetes is a side effect. And yes, I did get prednisolone. The vet wanted to start him at 10 mg, but I wanted to do 5 mg, so we met in the middle.
The main side effect that can come from long term steroid use is diabetes. Patches was on 10 mg a day when he was really sick and then he was cut down to 5 mg. Now that I think about it he did stay on the 5 mg a day until the vet couldn't get the pred anymore. I don't know how the pred dose translates to the dex. When I looked it up online I found out that it is a much stronger steroid than the prednisolone.
I do know that you want the prednisolone and not prednisone. The liver actually turns the prednisone into prenisolone so it's harder on the liver and you end up with the same medicine.
When Patches was on Flagyl the vet gave me the gel caps. She, well actually probably the vet tech, cut up the pills and put them in the gel caps for me. The two mild flares he has had since she gave him the flagyl again and I got them cut up in the gel caps. I didn't get the biopsy done we just went on the assumption that it is IBD.
I know others here have their cats on 2 1/2 mg a day and some give it every other day. Patches has always gotten it daily.
Well, it seems at this point that he has only had one confirmed bout of pancreatitis back in July. I will keep budesonide on the table as an option. The doc did reluctantly (because it doesn't work as well for this condition) offer the steroid injection Depo Medrol (sp?) to reduce the stress of pilling, but I heard some bad things about it and refused it. I figured if he has a bad reaction to it, then I'm screwed. At least with the pred, it can be stopped. Are blood glucose checks only done at the vet through blood work? Can they be done at home?
Re diet: What about Nature's Variety , at least the canned. I think that would be lower carb. My cat's internist (a DACVIM) recommended the canned NVI in a novel protein as something that would be lower carb than the "prescription" food.
I think their rabbit may be from China but they also have venison or lamb. The rabbit and the venison have pork liver. but maybe that is novel to him too? The lamb has only lamb .
Louis ate the venison and did very well on it. ( and i saw what happened when he got into some other food with beef and had bloody vomit and diarrhea which he never had on the NVI venison)
Unfortunately, their dry foods all have chicken meal included except the Limited Ingredient , but that's got turkey.
( Louis was already diabetic which is why the vet was more concerned about the carbs with him.)
But since Sebastian liked the S & C's Rabbit, I agree with LDG -- why not contact them about the possibility of small amounts of other proteins. you obviously have to feed him something he will eat!
Oh, okay. That makes me feel better. It does seem like Flagyl is one of the safer antibiotics, relatively speaking.
Patches took them both when he was sick. It also has an anti-inflammatory effect along with being an antibiotic. I think for IBD the antibiotic is kind of a safeguard thing. When the digestive system isn't working right bad bacteria can overpopulate. The way she explained it to me the anatomy of the cat makes it very easy for an overpopulation of bad bacteria to move into the liver.
I think Flagyl has become the automatic medication for digestive problems with cats. The vets that I took him to before the one he goes to now always gave him Flagyl even though they didn't really have a clue what was going on with him.
I do hope to incorporate some alternative treatments as soon as I work out a plan to not make it stressful. I hope to give him one gel cap that contains all his pills, followed by one syringe with all his supplements once a day. Is this wishful thinking?Chumley, as it turned out, didn't have IBD. We don't know what it was in terms of Western Medicine, but he had an energy imbalance and a GI bacterial imbalance that (without biopsy) our traditional vets were calling IBD. This was corrected with Chinese Meds and Probiotics. We used slippery elm bark powder and George's aloe vera juice to reduce his GI inflammation.
He was given 4 or 5 courses of treatment with Flagyl. It did nothing for him. I personally am not a believer in using antibiotics without knowledge of an infection or bacterial overgrowth. ...and based on Chumley's experience and the rescue kittens this summer, I've become a believer in the use of probiotics for bacterial overgrowth. Of course, if it's known there is an infection, I would suggest the use of antibiotics and THEN probiotics.
...and hopefully the issue of long term use of pred (ETA: or any steroid) with Sebastian won't be a problem.he'll need them only short term.
Yes they sure can be done at home, using the same glucometers that human diabetics use. for example the Reli-On from Walmart has very good reviews. There's a lot of tips, videos etc. online about home blood glucose testing for cats. In fact it's more likely to be accurate at home because it's less affected by stress.
Are blood glucose checks only done at the vet through blood work? Can they be done at home?
No, you wouldn't be familiar with Chum's story, that was back in 2010. His labs were normal. His symptom was horrible, chronic diarrhea. Reading his story wouldn't be of any help to you in this situation.I don't recall what Chumley's symptoms were or what his labs looked like. Where his numbers off? Or was he just not eating? If you want to direct me to the thread about Chumley, that is fine, too. I'll read it.
Of course, all of the resources I am coming across want to treat the bacteria with an extended course of antibiotics. I will opt to start with the probiotics with the additional strains, including S. Boulardii. By the way, here's another resource that was interesting. It's for human and animal models, but they talk about probiotics towards the end: Importance of Bacteria as Trigger in Inflammatory Bowel DiseaseNeutrophilic cholangitis is thought to arise following ascending infection from the gastrointestinal tract. Hence, it may be more frequently associated with pancreatitis.
http://www.ivis.org/journals/vetfocus/19_2/en/5.pdf
So if Sebastian was your cat, would you give him another round of Flagyl? I'm just looking for your opinion. I value what you guys have to say.
That anatomy of the cat is why vets give the flagyl so freely with gastro problems even if they don't know what the problem is.
Most conventional vets are against feeding raw because of bacteria. My vet, even though she doesn't really push it, does prefer wet over canned. A lot of vets think there is no difference and a few actually prefer dry over wet.