Should you crate/cage a cat recovering from surgery?

My sweet Jack is undergoing surgery today. Fibrosarcoma. The prognosis isn't good but he still has a great quality of life and I want to give him every chance to live out his days in comfort.

I've been reading up on how to care for a cat post-surgery and some sites recommend crating the cat and others suggest confining him to a room. His tumor is on his side and I wonder if movement will be good or bad for him. I'll of course ask the vet when we pick him up, but what has your experience been?

Unless otherwise specified by your vet, for most cats being confined in a bathroom or small bedroom for the evening after surgery and possibly the day after should be fine. That's so any anesthesia/sedatives/heavy pain meds can wear off or their effects can be closely monitored.

If the tumor is large, you may be getting into muscle involvement. In that case, a small cage is probably best for the first 2 days, depending on how the cat seems to be feeling.

After major surgery most cats won't overdue it. They'll naturally limit themselves. Especially adult cats. Now crazy 7 month old males or something, well that's a little different,

My angel kitty Taco had 2 surgeries for sarcoma; first time was to remove the one golf ball sized tumor on his right shoulder/scruff area. Unfortunately it returned 4 months later and he developed 2 new ones as well. When the first one returned, he underwent more aggressive surgery to remove it along with more removal of surrounding tissue (right down to muscle). The Vet said he removed the equivalent of 2 golf balls' worth of tissue/muscle/tumor. Taco was a big boy, at 18 lbs (he was 15 yrs old). For each surgery, I kept him in my spare bedroom for the night and tried to ensure there wasn't anything he could jump up or down from, though I couldn't remove the heavy sofa/sofa bed in there and he did jump up onto it (that's where he often would curl up and sleep). The next morning, following each surgery, I would let him out of his room, which he was thrilled with. Luckily my Vet does laser surgery so there is less trauma and bleeding and healing is quicker. Taco was also diabetic (though very well regulated, got 2 shots of insulin per day) but he healed wonderfully following both surgeries.

Here's a video I took of him (on youtube) a week after his 2nd surgery; you can see the rubber drain that's still in place. Taco's relentless addiction to food and treats remained :-) He climbed up onto the kitchen table to get these treats, knock then onto the floor and he was ruthless in trying to get the lid off (he was amazing at getting the lid off):



Where is your kitty's tumor located?

Depending on where it's located, you might have to do what I had to; get him to wear an infant tank-top to prevent kitty from licking at the surgical area.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

PS - might be a good idea to raise your cat's food dish up some so that kitty doesn't have to bend head down as much to reach it. Fold up a big towel and place bowl/plate on it. Maybe use a larger water bowl so that level of water is higher up.

Thank you both for your responses. I really hope that a room is enough because Jack hates cages and I don't want to stress him out any more than he already is. I think I'm going to get a cage just in case he needs it, and I can return it if it is unused.

Jack looks quite a bit like Taco, right down to the chub! He's also a food nut. We feed our little cat (Lily) up on the table because Jack shoves her out of the way and eats her food too. Yesterday before we took him to the vet he was trying very hard to maneuver the chairs out enough so he could climb up and eat her leftovers.

Jack's tumor is about the size of a golf ball and it is on his trunk a few inches away from his front leg. It hasn't seemed to affect him in any way; his personality and activity levels are exactly the same as usual. We know that the sarcoma will grow back but felt like we needed to give him some more time, as long as he is a happy cat (and he is).

the_food_lady - thanks, I know I will have a bunch of questions and it's nice to have someone to talk to who has been there. This is hard!

Hello,

Just to give you a little bit of hope, Taco's biggest tumor was between his spine and right shoulder blade. As it got bigger, it was in right up against spine, even over it. I had always feared that one day it would impinge on his spinal cord and impact his mobility but it never did and at its largest, it was half the size of a tennis ball and it didn't impact his mobility in the least and I was amazed at how much the skin stretched to accommodated it. It was a good year from the time I first found the lump to when I had to help him cross over. I think in his case, the first removal was not aggressive enough and the Vet didn't leave wide enough margins (based on the pathology report it showed in some areas the margins were very thin). Had he been as aggressive with the first removal as he was with the 2nd, the outcome might have been different? I do know these are aggressive tumors and that it's said that once you remove them, this increases the likelihood of them returning (I guess because you're sort of, in essence, disrupting the cancer cells and there may be stray cells that remain).....but I belonged, at the time, to a wonderful Yahoo Group for owners of kitties with fibrosarcoma, vaccine associated sarcoma, etc. I encourage you to join:


http://www.feline-vas-support.org/

If that one doesn't work, here's another I belonged to:

http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/feline-cancer/

There were several kitties on there who had the surgery and it was very successful such that they remained cancer free !!! --- so you just never do know?! :-)

Due to the location of your kitty's tumor, sounds like you may need to take steps to prevent him from licking at it. I know most Vets recommend an e-collar for this kind of thing but most cats hate them (though strangely I have 2 young ones that don't mind it that much)....Taco was furious if I put it on him, he would act like he couldn't walk and he was so angry LOL ...so I would try various infant clothing, and found a very snug fitting tank-top worked the best. See pic:

If it might give you any comfort....

My aunt's cat had injection-site sarcoma in 2002. My aunt was old, ill, lived alone, and dreaded losing her only companion, so she didn't tell anyone her cat had a tumor. When I finally saw the cat, the tumor was the size of half a tennis ball between her shoulders, and it was open, and clearly causing pain. Against my aunt's objections, I took the cat to the vet as soon as I realized the situation. (She told me that if her cat died at the vet, SHE would die... luckily, I inherited her stubbornness ) The cat was in her late teens, maybe older; the vet was not optimistic, but promised to do his best.

The cat recovered nicely and the tumor never returned. My aunt died in 2004, and her cat died of other causes in 2005. At that point she had to be in her 20s, was deaf, and had dementia.

Hang in there, and don't give up hope!

Bunnelina, thanks for a hopeful story!

Jack came through the surgery just fine and we brought him home last night. He was lethargic yesterday and isn't exactly energetic today but he wants to be with people and is trying to stick pretty close to me.

The incision was quite large. There's a tiny bit of bleeding (more like oozing) at one stitch but otherwise it seems that he is healing ok. I can't tell if he is having any pain (we're supposed to give him the painkiller 3-4 times per day), but he wants to jump up on everything so I'm guessing it isn't too bad.