Hello everyone, long-time viewer, first-time poster. I'm hoping to get some advice with regard to my new cat, Kensi.
I adopted Kensi from a shelter just after New Year's, and at the time she was about five months old. She is a black DSH, and was spayed immediately before I brought her home.
In late October when she arrived at the shelter she had a URI and was prescribed Doxycycline for two weeks; about a week later they started her on another 10-day dose. I am assuming that her condition didn't improve, because in early December she was given Clavamox for 10 days. When I visited the shelter she seemed fine, and I was told about the URI, but the shelter said that the problem had cleared up.
At any rate, immediately after I brought her home I noticed that while she was exploring my new apartment (and smelling everything she could reach) I could actually hear her sniffing. It sounded a little like her nose was congested, so I kept an eye on her. That night I heard her sneeze, and yellow snot went flying. I had an appointment with my vet for a general wellness exam scheduled for five days later, and each day until then she continued the cycle; she would be fine, then suddenly she sounded congested, she would sneeze, and then would appear to be fine again.
I brought her to my vet for the checkup and other than the sneezing/mucus she was given a clean bill of health. Because she was pretty young and had already gotten quite a lot of antibiotics my vet told me to keep an eye on her for a while and bring her back in if things got any worse.
Over the next seven or eight weeks she started to sneeze less and less often, lessening to perhaps every 36 hours at first, then about every other day. The mucus continued, but it changed in a couple of different ways: the color became paler (resembling what I would say is normal human "snot", like when you need to blow your nose), and the mucus started to become dryer, in that when she sneezed a long, dried "booger" (for lack of a better word) would go flying. I also started to notice that after she sneezed and there was mucus residue on her nose it was always inside the left nostril.
At any rate, about a month ago I suddenly realized that the sneezing had stopped completely at some point. I have only heard her sneeze once over the last four to six weeks, and there was no nasal discharge. The disappearance of the problem roughly coincided with when the weather here in the Chicago area started to change, with temperatures at night staying above freezing and humidity levels starting to rise. At that point I decided to plan on buying a humidifier for next winter in case the air in my apartment was too dry over the colder months; I figure it can't hurt either Kensi or myself.
So anyway, all was great for about a month. Then one day a week or so ago I was sitting on the couch and Kensi joined me for a nap. I looked at her and her left eye was watering, with some of the tears starting to run out of the corner of her eye down the side of her nose. At the time I thought perhaps she had scratched her eye, or gotten some fur in there, so I didn't really worry about it that much. I kept an eye on it (no pun intended) and the next day all seemed fine.
Later that evening, I noticed her eye watering again. It seemed to last a little longer than the previous day, but she wasn't pawing at it at all and wasn't blinking excessively. The fluid was also perfectly clear, so it appeared to simply be tears.
Anyway, the problem seemed to get a little worse each day until the point a few days ago where her eye was watering almost nonstop. I called my local cat clinic and was able to get her in to be seen that afternoon. The vet put dye in her eyes and used a black light to see if there were any scratches or abnormalities, and found nothing. The only thing that was somewhat unusual was that the dye in her left eye did not seem to be flowing freely through her tear ducts like the right eye; in her right nostril you could see the dye that had flowed into her nose, but there was very little dye in her left nostril.
The vet thought that perhaps her tear duct was blocked, or that it didn't develop at the right angle, preventing the tears from leaving her eye. I questioned the latter explanation, since the problem just recently appeared, but he said it could still be a possibility. At any rate, he prescribed Terramycin twice a day for 12 days, and I have been applying a small amount to the corner of her eye where the tear duct is as per my vet's instructions. Including the first application at the vet's office, I have been applying it in the morning and at night since Wednesday (it is now Saturday).
My vet said that I should notice an improvement within two to three days. As of today it appears that her eye is watering a little less often, but when it does water it still waters quite a bit.
Now to my point: has anyone else experienced anything similar? I'm trying to get a handle on this. I know one possibility is that the left side of her face hasn't developed normally, although from the outside it looks symmetrical. I also considered feline herpes, but she was vaccinated while at the shelter and the fact that the sneezing mucus--and now the eye--have both occurred only on the left side of her face seems odd.
Sorry for the extremely long post, but I'm looking forward to hearing your responses. Thanks in advance.
I adopted Kensi from a shelter just after New Year's, and at the time she was about five months old. She is a black DSH, and was spayed immediately before I brought her home.
In late October when she arrived at the shelter she had a URI and was prescribed Doxycycline for two weeks; about a week later they started her on another 10-day dose. I am assuming that her condition didn't improve, because in early December she was given Clavamox for 10 days. When I visited the shelter she seemed fine, and I was told about the URI, but the shelter said that the problem had cleared up.
At any rate, immediately after I brought her home I noticed that while she was exploring my new apartment (and smelling everything she could reach) I could actually hear her sniffing. It sounded a little like her nose was congested, so I kept an eye on her. That night I heard her sneeze, and yellow snot went flying. I had an appointment with my vet for a general wellness exam scheduled for five days later, and each day until then she continued the cycle; she would be fine, then suddenly she sounded congested, she would sneeze, and then would appear to be fine again.
I brought her to my vet for the checkup and other than the sneezing/mucus she was given a clean bill of health. Because she was pretty young and had already gotten quite a lot of antibiotics my vet told me to keep an eye on her for a while and bring her back in if things got any worse.
Over the next seven or eight weeks she started to sneeze less and less often, lessening to perhaps every 36 hours at first, then about every other day. The mucus continued, but it changed in a couple of different ways: the color became paler (resembling what I would say is normal human "snot", like when you need to blow your nose), and the mucus started to become dryer, in that when she sneezed a long, dried "booger" (for lack of a better word) would go flying. I also started to notice that after she sneezed and there was mucus residue on her nose it was always inside the left nostril.
At any rate, about a month ago I suddenly realized that the sneezing had stopped completely at some point. I have only heard her sneeze once over the last four to six weeks, and there was no nasal discharge. The disappearance of the problem roughly coincided with when the weather here in the Chicago area started to change, with temperatures at night staying above freezing and humidity levels starting to rise. At that point I decided to plan on buying a humidifier for next winter in case the air in my apartment was too dry over the colder months; I figure it can't hurt either Kensi or myself.
So anyway, all was great for about a month. Then one day a week or so ago I was sitting on the couch and Kensi joined me for a nap. I looked at her and her left eye was watering, with some of the tears starting to run out of the corner of her eye down the side of her nose. At the time I thought perhaps she had scratched her eye, or gotten some fur in there, so I didn't really worry about it that much. I kept an eye on it (no pun intended) and the next day all seemed fine.
Later that evening, I noticed her eye watering again. It seemed to last a little longer than the previous day, but she wasn't pawing at it at all and wasn't blinking excessively. The fluid was also perfectly clear, so it appeared to simply be tears.
Anyway, the problem seemed to get a little worse each day until the point a few days ago where her eye was watering almost nonstop. I called my local cat clinic and was able to get her in to be seen that afternoon. The vet put dye in her eyes and used a black light to see if there were any scratches or abnormalities, and found nothing. The only thing that was somewhat unusual was that the dye in her left eye did not seem to be flowing freely through her tear ducts like the right eye; in her right nostril you could see the dye that had flowed into her nose, but there was very little dye in her left nostril.
The vet thought that perhaps her tear duct was blocked, or that it didn't develop at the right angle, preventing the tears from leaving her eye. I questioned the latter explanation, since the problem just recently appeared, but he said it could still be a possibility. At any rate, he prescribed Terramycin twice a day for 12 days, and I have been applying a small amount to the corner of her eye where the tear duct is as per my vet's instructions. Including the first application at the vet's office, I have been applying it in the morning and at night since Wednesday (it is now Saturday).
My vet said that I should notice an improvement within two to three days. As of today it appears that her eye is watering a little less often, but when it does water it still waters quite a bit.
Now to my point: has anyone else experienced anything similar? I'm trying to get a handle on this. I know one possibility is that the left side of her face hasn't developed normally, although from the outside it looks symmetrical. I also considered feline herpes, but she was vaccinated while at the shelter and the fact that the sneezing mucus--and now the eye--have both occurred only on the left side of her face seems odd.
Sorry for the extremely long post, but I'm looking forward to hearing your responses. Thanks in advance.
