After 98 days..... I finally see....

Formed poop!!! Yey!!!!!!!!!
For those who don't know, Bugsy has had diarrhea since October 10th, when he took his first dose of Clavamox for an UTI... Since then he has been in and out of vets, including for an emergency when he stopped eating due to an unknown fever. He has been os several rounds of Metronidazole, Tylan, Prednizolan, Metro and Pred together, for no avail. He is also on fiber and a high dose of probiotic, called Proviable-DC. Now as a final medication try, his vet put him on Sulfasalazine and that seems to do the trick! He will be on it for 10 days, yesterday was day 6 and finally I see formed poop!!! Yey!!!!
I am cautiously optimistic, after 98 days, I know things can go wrong after we stop the medication, but I also know the other medications didn't work even while he was on them. So this is a very good sign!
I will get gross now - warning: this was not tootsie roll poop, normal kitty poop, but it was rope-shaped all the way from beginning to end, HUGE difference from the liquid cow pie he was having before!
Now I just hope he holds his own!!!
For good poop from now on!

Was the vet ever able to figure out what went wrong? By the sound of it, it would seem that it was a antibiotic resistant bacteria (augmentin, the human version of clavamox, set me up for that c. diff overgrowth I had) - so did the vet ever culture for whatever they could grow? Knowing what you're up against would be nice.

When Tomas was a kitten he had a bacterial overgrowth. The night before he was fine, but as of 7 am the following morning he vomited and had a fever.

I hope his stools remain good and this last antibiotic solves the problem.

Hooray for formed poop

Let's hope he can keep it up.

Wow, good for Bugsy!!!

I would never have known it was good news by looking at your post!!

Keep up the good work Bugsy!!

Originally Posted by strange_wings

Was the vet ever able to figure out what went wrong? By the sound of it, it would seem that it was a antibiotic resistant bacteria (augmentin, the human version of clavamox, set me up for that c. diff overgrowth I had) - so did the vet ever culture for whatever they could grow? Knowing what you're up against would be nice.

When Tomas was a kitten he had a bacterial overgrowth. The night before he was fine, but as of 7 am the following morning he vomited and had a fever.

I hope his stools remain good and this last antibiotic solves the problem.

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All his tests indicated that Clavamox killed his intestinal flora which caused a bacterial overgrowth initiating an inflammation on his intestinal tract. All this time Bugsy only had one day of fever (way later on), so he did not have an infection, per se - his problem is really a bad inflammation and lack of intestinal flora. The specialized tests did not show enough inflammation to be compatible with IBD, nor pancreatitis. The problem is, as I already know, Bugsy's immune system is not the best in the world, and he is having a hard time fighting this inflammation. He does get better to a point, but never completely better...
Both Tylan and Metro are antibiotics, Tylan being broader, so if the problem was a bacterial issue, it would been taken care of by now.
The key however was to reduce the inflammation to a point where the intestinal flora could regrow to a healthy level. Sulfasalazine seems to be doing the trick now... or it might just be time and all the probitotics he has been taking...
No bacterial issue was shown in a comprehensive fecal test run at Texas A&M.

Doin' the poop dance!

Bugsy is celebrating Gotcha Day in his own way - with formed poop! WTG, Bugsy!

Originally Posted by LDG

Doin' the poop dance!

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Okay you're cracking me up!!! Way to "GO" Bugsy!! I knew you had it in ya!!!

Originally Posted by Carolina

No bacterial issue was shown in a comprehensive fecal test run at Texas A&M.

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Odd, you would think they would find something. I assume this was after a couple courses of metro, though? So that may have been why. I hope nothing sets off another flare up. One way to prevent that, at least in people, is to prescribe metro along with whatever other antibiotic is needed (say for a URI or something that takes a different class of antibiotics), I don't know if that's done in animals, and obviously the best choice is to avoid antibiotic use as much as possible.

Originally Posted by strange_wings

Odd, you would think they would find something. I assume this was after a couple courses of metro, though? So that may have been why. I hope nothing sets off another flare up. One way to prevent that, at least in people, is to prescribe metro along with whatever other antibiotic is needed (say for a URI or something that takes a different class of antibiotics), I don't know if that's done in animals, and obviously the best choice is to avoid antibiotic use as much as possible.

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Off hand I am not sure if it was before or after metro, but it might been after... I know it is odd, but again, Bugsy is an odd cat. He had several Metro courses, the longest was for a month. The plan now is to stop Sulfasalazine after the 10 days and see how he does; if he has diarrhea after he stops, he will go back on and we will run a liver panel after a week as Sulfasalazine can affect the liver and needs close monitoring in cats when used long term. I am hoping that will not be necessary though...

That's great news! I'm so glad to read that Bugsy is doing better! 98 days of diarrhea! That poor cat! Hopefully that's over for him now.

How is Gracie?

That is great news!! Sending more vibes for continued improvement!!

You are such a mom, talking about your babies poop!

I'll be doing the continued firm poop dance for Bugsy too!

With three cats who have/had giardia, I can absolutely relate to the excitement over solid poo! I hope your little man will keep having them!

Yay Bugsy!
Hopefully this is a good sign of many, many, normal, firm poops in his future!

Hooray for you and for Bugsy!! What an improvement!

You know the Huggies/Pampers commercial about "Doin the potty dance?" This thread reminds me of it lol!

Soooooo glad he is FINALLY on the mend!!!!

It sucks when you can't get a definate cause of illness, but sometimes they just can't figure it out. (maybe multiple things caused the sickness) The vets could never figure out what caused Bear to get Chlorhepatitis, from my research it is common for cats with Bears issue to never have a known cause. I wonder if he has immune issues.

Anyway, I know you are SO relieved that he is finally showing improvment!!!!!!

HURRAY! FOR FORMED POOP!

Well.... We got 2 days of good poop, and then unfortunately Bugsy had to go through a food change that put him back on square one... but it wasnecessary - let me explain what happened:
I had been noticing for a while that the kitties, Bugsy, Lucky and Hope were all getting finicky towards Z/D dry... They were not eating as much as they should... I kept running after them to get them to eat... I thought Lucky's appetite was low due to hairballs, but then noticed the other kitties were low loo. Thinking it might be a bad bag, I bought a second bag from a vet's office... Same thing - I went out of town and the report from Kelly was the same. I got a Third bag from another vet's office to make sure I had it from a different batch and sure enough.... Same thing. Yesterday I weighed the kids - Bugsy first: 16.4lbs, down from 18.3 at 11/20/2010... Lucky 11.4lbs down from 12.5 6 months ago. I called my vet immediately to change the food at once to Royal Canin Hypoallergenic HP23, which would be my only possible option for Hope due to her intestinal issues, and he agreed with the changes... Of course I am doing the transition very slowly, but any change threw Bugsy off balance...
For me though I rather anytime have them eating (and they LOVED the new food) then going without food - I rather any day deal with diarrhea than with Heaptic Lipidosis, so I am fine with waiting a little longer for Bugsy to be OK. I already waited 100 days, I can wait 110.
I feel confident enough that this medicine works, as I finally saw results with it, and that for me is a very good sign - something that I hadn't seen in all this time. So tomorrow I will call the vet to see what he wants to do about it... What is probably going to happen is we will have to refill this medicine and he will have to have a blood test a week into it as it can affect the liver (this specific medicine breaks down into salicylic acid, so it needs to be closely monitored when used in cats for over 2 weeks with bi-weekly blood tests from then on).
Let's hope this is just a bump on the road and that he is going to be alright once he gets over the food change...
The good thing is that now he is at a healthy weight... The bad thing is how he got there...
He is doing AMAZING otherwise... Very playful, running around, is not jaundice, happy, loving, playing terror, getting in trouble, and just being the wonderful kitty who stole my heart on day one!
Thank you for all the vibes and the love you all send to my boy... it is very much appreciated

YEAH!!! for solid poops I do a "poop dance" after Pipsqueak's bouts of IBD. Hopefully your kitty is fully recovered now.