Please help with my ill cat HELP

jordi

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Hello,

My cat is a cross between Siamese and European cat. One year ago, she had a bronchitis. I changed of veterinary 3 times because none of them were able to cure that illness, and got worse. As a result of the medication, her liver got inflamed and the veterinary said that she had a pancreatitis (inflamation of pancreas).

The third veterinary cured her bronchitis. But 2 months later the cat continued coughing. Her bronchial tubes were clean, so the veterinary said us that it was an allergy.

In the following months, every month and a half, she used to cough and sneeze. Then, we took them to the veterinary and he used an injection of cortisone to stop it. This repeated every month and a half.

We changed the litter box sand, and with the pass of time, coughs and sneezes have stopped or happen only sometimes.

But she started to lick her belly and in a line from the belly to the neck until she took her hair out. At the beginning the veterinary said that her throat was inflamed, but now it doesn't happen.

But this happens every month and a half: the cat stops eating her dry food, and sometimes regurgitates it (without having digested it) and makes gestures as if she can't swallow the food. When this happens, we take her to the veterinary, who injects her cortisone. Then we feed her with wet food, that is the only thing that she can eat. Some times she has difficulty for eating that too, but 5 days later she eats more, and we get her back to eat dry food 7-11 days later, that is when she can eat it again. Usually, 1 month and a half later the problem starts again.

When she eats wet food she asks for it every 1 hour, and if we don't give it, she sometimes vomits, so when she is ill we can't sleep at all. If the can has been opened more than 4 hours ago, she doesn't like it.

Please don't recommend me to change of veterinary 'cos I've talked with them all, and none of them is interested in a solution of the problem, just in solving the temporary problem (just the symptoms).

Also, I will value specially the opinions of people that suffered something similar or have a deep knowledge to solve this.

Can someone help me? Does someone of you had the same problem? How did you solve it?

Thanks in advance!
 

mews2much

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Has she been checked for asthma?
My Oreo has had bronchitis a few times this year alteady and her fur fell out.
It turned out she is allergic to omany things.
Maybe your cat is a allergic.
I was told my Coco had bronchitis and it was asthma.
She would lick herself also and her fur fell out in clumps.
What you desribe is alot like what happned to Coco.
Are theshots Depo Medrol?
They are bad to stay on and made Coco get other problems.
She has a inhaler now.
 
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jordi

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Thanks.

SHe is not asthmatic at all. As I said, she doesn't coughs now, it only happens sometimes. The real problem now is digestive. The veterinarian said that she is NOT asthmatic.
 

skimble

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Can you feed her ONLY canned food and feed her small amounts more often during the day?

Could it possibly be a hairball problem? Sometimes they will go through the motions and not actually vomit hair.

I too believe the cortisone injections will contribute to other health issues. They are necessary for some health problems, just be informed from your vet as to the side affects.

Keep trying and maybe something will help.
 
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jordi

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Yes we may give her all wet food but in our country it is really expensive and the best ones are only 20% protein (almost all only 10%) so our cat may die because it doesn't reaches the minimum of proteins needed daily.

We need to change to a mixed diet. I read about EVO but it is not available in our country. We may, with big effort, find ACANA GRASSLANDS or ORIJEN:

http://www.orijen.ca/orijen/products...nAnalysis.aspx
http://www.championpetfoods.com/acan...ormulation=gfc

Acana seems good. Orijen is similar to EVO. Do you think they're good?

As I said, I know the problems with cortisone but no vet wants to give me a solution or a diagnose.
 

kittymonsters

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Jordi,

It sounds to me it is a possibility that your kitty has chronic pancreatitis. I have a kitty with this. My kitty will be fine for weeks then he gets a flare up, starts vomiting and won't eat. I have to give him Prednisolone ( a steroid like the cortisone) to help the inflammation go down.

He is now on prednisolone pills for life and he still has flare ups. He just had one last week and the Vet gave him an injection this time. It was a shot of penicillin and a steroid called triminclone. This amazingly had my kitty back to "normal" in 12 hours. He was eating, playing and being a happy kitty.

There is a syndrome called Triaditis, which can tend to go along with Chronic pancreatitis. IBD is one of the illnesses and can cause the vomiting without the diarrhea symptoms.

The only real way to diagnose these things is by biopsy, however, a vet with a good ultrasound machine and being an experienced in reading difficult ultrasounds can make a good educated opinion of this may be the case.

I think your vet is on the right track, but things may not be getting explained very well.

No matter what food you feed if this is chronic pancreatitis and/or Triaditis your kitty still may have flare ups. So if you cannot feed wet only it may not make that big of a difference.

There are studies to show that IBD/Triaditis/chronic pancreatitis kitties do better on raw diets. I don't feed raw, but I do feed homemade food. If this is something you are willing to try talk to your vet about it. It may help your kitty.

I hope you get some solid answers soon and please keep us updated.
 

skimble

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Originally Posted by jordi

Yes we may give her all wet food but in our country it is really expensive and the best ones are only 20% protein (almost all only 10%) so our cat may die because it doesn't reaches the minimum of proteins needed daily.
Did you calculate the protein based on the dry matter analysis of the canned food? The protein may be much higher than you think.

List the canned food that is in your budget and maybe someone can help.

Example:
Look at the "Guaranteed Analysis" on the label
Subtract the moisture percentage from 100 %
Divide the resulting figure into the crude protein figure (disregard decimals when dividing)
The result will be a close approximation of protein by dry matter value

IF protein is 8.5 % and moisture is 78% (so 100% less 78% is 22)
divide the remaining 22 into the 8.5 protein equals 38.5% protein by dry matter.

You have to take away the moisture (water) content of the food to calculate the protein.

Sorry if this is confusing.....I am hoping someone may explain better.
 
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jordi

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<quote>

It sounds to me it is a possibility that your kitty has chronic pancreatitis. I have a kitty with this. My kitty will be fine for weeks then he gets a flare up, starts vomiting and won't eat. I have to give him Prednisolone ( a steroid like the cortisone) to help the inflammation go down.

He is now on prednisolone pills for life and he still has flare ups. He just had one last week and the Vet gave him an injection this time. It was a shot of penicillin and a steroid called triminclone. This amazingly had my kitty back to "normal" in 12 hours. He was eating, playing and being a happy kitty.

There is a syndrome called Triaditis, which can tend to go along with Chronic pancreatitis. IBD is one of the illnesses and can cause the vomiting without the diarrhea symptoms.

The only real way to diagnose these things is by biopsy, however, a vet with a good ultrasound machine and being an experienced in reading difficult ultrasounds can make a good educated opinion of this may be the case.

I think your vet is on the right track, but things may not be getting explained very well.

No matter what food you feed if this is chronic pancreatitis and/or Triaditis your kitty still may have flare ups. So if you cannot feed wet only it may not make that big of a difference.

There are studies to show that IBD/Triaditis/chronic pancreatitis kitties do better on raw diets. I don't feed raw, but I do feed homemade food. If this is something you are willing to try talk to your vet about it. It may help your kitty.

I hope you get some solid answers soon and please keep us updated.[/quote]

Thanks for your answer. How long has your kitty been ill from this? I fear that mine should not live very longer taking steroids.
 

carolina

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Originally Posted by jordi

Yes we may give her all wet food but in our country it is really expensive and the best ones are only 20% protein (almost all only 10%) so our cat may die because it doesn't reaches the minimum of proteins needed daily.

We need to change to a mixed diet. I read about EVO but it is not available in our country. We may, with big effort, find ACANA GRASSLANDS or ORIJEN:

http://www.orijen.ca/orijen/products...nAnalysis.aspx
http://www.championpetfoods.com/acan...ormulation=gfc

Acana seems good. Orijen is similar to EVO. Do you think they're good?

As I said, I know the problems with cortisone but no vet wants to give me a solution or a diagnose.
Jordi - are these commercial cat foods? Can you post the name, ingredient and analysis for us?
It is normal on wet food for water to be 78-82%, so yes, you are right about the 10% protein range... This is the normal average, and your cat will most definitely not die from it (provided it is cat food).
About Orijen and Acana: Top quality great food, IMO there is no better as far as dry food, however it might be too rich for your kitty if he has IBD... I am not sure if it is too rich for pancreatitis kitties - I would check with your vet, or with other members that have the same problems.
 

kittymonsters

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Originally Posted by jordi

Thanks for your answer. How long has your kitty been ill from this? I fear that mine should not live very longer taking steroids.
My kitty has been sick for over two years. He has had steroids on and off for that time. In December 2008 he went on the prednisolone at 10mg a day for two months and that has gradually gotten down to 2.5 mg a day. He has not been off the steroids since December, so for 7.5 months. He will remain on the 2.5 mg for life.

Please do not be afraid of the steroids if they help your kitty. My thoughts were, my kitty is going to die without them so the taking the steroids is better than not taking them. I will keep this up as long as he can be a happy cat and have a good quality of life.

Cats for some reason seem to do better on long term steroids than humans or dogs do.

We also give my kitty vitamin B12 injections once a week. This is based on the protocal from TAMU http://www.cvm.tamu.edu/gilab/research/cobalamin.shtml This seems to be helping him keep his weight up.


BTW, what is your kitty's name?
 
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jordi

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Her name is Lilit.

I will try to see if a change in her diet improves her health, and comment what you say with the vet. Thank you!
 
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jordi

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We have purchased this dry food:
http://www.almonature.co.uk/cat_prod...&lng=3#content

Almo with Lamb and rice. It is hypoalergenic, lamb meat and digestive. I know it has rice, but other alternatives contain tons of fruit which is also unnatural. My cat dislikes everything that is sweet and that includes most of the fruits.

And we will also give her wet food daily, 50% dry 50% wet or more probably 30% dry 70% wet. I am choosing wet foods that I can find that are better, with low fat, no carbs or very little, high protein and no cereals. Any advice on percentages or something?

I noticed that I was calculating the wrong way proteins in wet food, because I read the quantities with humidity. There are some that are good, and they're not famous or expensive brands.

I I have found 2 brands, that have good levels of protein, Compy and also the brand of Carrefour looks good.
 

carolina

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Originally Posted by jordi

We have purchased this dry food:
http://www.almonature.co.uk/cat_prod...&lng=3#content

Almo with Lamb and rice. It is hypoalergenic, lamb meat and digestive. I know it has rice, but other alternatives contain tons of fruit which is also unnatural. My cat dislikes everything that is sweet and that includes most of the fruits.

And we will also give her wet food daily, 50% dry 50% wet or more probably 30% dry 70% wet. I am choosing wet foods that I can find that are better, with low fat, no carbs or very little, high protein and no cereals. Any advice on percentages or something?

I noticed that I was calculating the wrong way proteins in wet food, because I read the quantities with humidity. There are some that are good, and they're not famous or expensive brands.

I I have found 2 brands, that have good levels of protein, Compy and also the brand of Carrefour looks good.
On wet food, I would stay away from by-products... As far as the tommy issues, try getting a clean formula, with one type of protein, and one or two types of grain at the most.
 

kittymonsters

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Lilit is a beautiful name. We love pictures here so if you have some you would like to post, we would like to see your girl


Carolina and Skimble have some good information on the food. There are other members here as well that can help in the food area if you post in the Nutrition forum. There is a lot of good informative discussion in general in that forum

It sounds like you are heading in the right direction to get her stabilized. The food you posted looks like a really good limited ingredient diet. If I have to feed a grain, rice is the one I choose. Even my IBD kitty did pretty good on the California Natural Chicken and rice. It's formulation is similar to the Almo Nature but used Chicken instead of lamb. For some reason it is difficult to find a Lamb based dry cat food here in the US. They make them for dogs, not cats.

Please keep us posted on how Lilit is doing and if the vets are able to come up with a definite diagnosis for her.
 
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jordi

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California Natural has one with lamb:

http://www.californianaturalpet.com/...fault.asp?id=3

In Europe there's also Grau:
https://www.zooplus.com/shop/cats/dr...od/grau/127018

I have set up an account in Imageshack so I can upload pics of my cats, and maybe also my two cockatiels. Here's a pic of Lilit:



She is my first cat. My wife had lived with other cats, but she's also her first own cat. She is in the cage we bought when we take her from the animal shelter.
Lilit never had a good health but always shown a great capacity of recovery from illnesses, so I hope that it is not too late.
She is also extremely intelligent, seems that she understands many things that we speak. One day we came from a walk and said "we must shut this little thing and take her to the vet", and she jumped and run.
 

kittymonsters

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Oh she is a gorgeous torti! It is amazing how a kitty can steal our hearts and know our thoughts. I am sure she knows just how much your and your wife adore her.

I am hoping you will see a dramatic improvement with the steroids. Has she been able to keep her food down the last couple of days?


Thank you for the links to the food as well. The California natural one is for their dog food though. For some reason they don't make a cat formula with lamb. Iams used to make a lamb and rice dry food for cats, but I can't find it any longer. It wasn't a great formula either though. I now make my cats food, but I don't use lamb because it is very expensive here. Having 6 kitties, I go through a lot of food.
 
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jordi

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Oh sorry, yes it's for dogs!

She is taking steroids every month and a half but it takes 5-7 days to work. I am not even sure if it is the steroids that make her difficult to eat dry or is simply dehydration.

We are thinking in keeping her with just cans for 1 month and a half, to see if she is better, as she seems to grow stronger with wet food. I suspect that she has some combination of allergy to corn and soy, and chronic dehydration

How do you make the food for your cats? Do you use a slicing machine? Do you include bone? Or is it easier than it looks in the tutorials that are on internet?
 

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Hi Jordi,

Sorry it has taken me this long to reply back.

I am wondering if keeping Lilit on a lower dose of steroids continuously would keep her more stable. Is she getting injections or pills?

Have you talked to the vet about possibly giving her subcutaneous fluids at home? I know it seems like it would be hard and scary, but it is really pretty easy to do. This would really help Lilit's chronic dehydration, especially when she is having vomiting episodes.

Getting Lilit on to more wet food than dry will help with the chronic dehydration as well.

When my Stomper has a flare up I always give him 100mls of fluids for a few days. I have another kitty with Chronic Renal Failure who I give fluids to everyday so I always have them here.

I do use a grinder for making the cat food. I don't do raw food because I myself have a compromised immune system. So I lightly bake the chicken and livers. The recipe I use if very similar to the ones for raw food you find on the internet.

Making the raw is actually quite easy, cooking the meat makes the whole process take much longer. I have found that making their food is actually less expensive than buying canned wet food for them.

Please give an update on how Lilit is doing when you have time.
 

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