Needle gauge

For those of you that give fluid therapy to their cats, do you use a 20 or 18 gauge needle? The vet gave me both today and I looked at the 18 gauge one. The thing looks huge!!! I know it would make the treament go faster but I don't want to hurt Popsie anymore than nessecary.

For reference: the bigger the number the smaller the needle

As for hurting the kitty - scruff skin is very tough, just think that mama carries the babies in her teeth by that skin

Also, the needles used to insert microchips are ginormous! Ollie got chipped and didn't even make a peep... the difference between the 18 and 20 really isn't that much and neither will hurt your kitty... I used to give SubQ fluids all the time when I worked at our vet and as cats get used to just the idea in general, they usually become ok with it

The less nervous/worried you are the calmer your baby will be as well

I used 20 gauge for Chase, and it still went quickly. So if you feel better using that one, I don't think it would make too much difference.

We usually ended up using the 20ga needle on our Zyelena. The 18ga wasn't markedly worse as I recall, though. Once we got her to settle down, the time difference didn't matter much, we'd just stroke her ears till the job was done. After we'd been doing treatments for a couple weeks she was pretty matter-of-fact about the whole operation, and this was a cat who tended to get really spooky and emotional about unpleasant things.

If it had been more of a hurry-up-and-get-it-over-with process, I probably would have opted for the 18ga needles more often.