3 month old kitten has ringworm - need help

Hi, I posted about a week ago about settling in my 10-12 week old kitten Jasper. Well now he's got ringworm! I took him him to the vet today, she gave him sporanox. It's in capsules. I have followed her instructions and mixed a capsule into a teaspoon of butter and divided that into 10 portions. He is supposed to have one portion per day for 7 days then 7 days off, repeat 2 more times. I tested him on some butter without the medication earlier today and he ate it all out of my hands. But now he won't take the butter with the medication. I don't know if he can smell the medication or just isn't hungry. Has anyone had experience with either this medication or giving similar stuff to their cats? I'm not sure if I should try mixing it (butter+sporanox) in with his wet food and seeing if that works. I've taken away his dry food now, hoping he gets hungry enough to eat whatever I give him. Also, I have started cleaning fabrics and surfaces that he has spent much time around. But I imagine it's quite difficult to get rid of the spores completely. I'm adding tea tree oil to the wash and spraying surfaces with a mix of tea tree oil and water. Does anyone have any further advice on ridding the house of the spores? I would hate to catch it myself or for Jasper to pick it up again. Any advice is much appreciated.

Hi there! I don't have any experience with ringworm but If you're in the UK, there's this stuff called Webbox lick-a-lix which is like a yoghurty paste - I find it's great for disguising crushed tablets and capsules and all my cats wolf it down. It comes in two flavours - salmon and chicken. Maybe give it a try with the sporanox? Hope everything turns out OK. ^_^

You can also try and smear on the butter on his fur, and hopefully he will lick it off!  

Good luck!

Thanks. I live in Australia. I haven't heard of the yoghurt paste but I could ask the pet store. I don't think putting it on his fur would work because the medicine is like little beads. Think they would fall off. But thanks for the suggestion. I did get him to eat it in his wet food but I had to leave it sitting out for a while. He is a grazer I'm very keen to hear any advice on dealing with ringworm in the home. That is, without burning or bleaching everything in site. Lol.

Yikes!! I have a ton of experience with ringworm as four years ago we rescued a 12 week old kitten with ringworm. My saving grace was that the kitten never "lived" in the house and was crated the entire time he was being treated. You have to take ringworm very seriously. The spores can live for up to two years and the ONLY thing that kills them is bleach or extremely high temps > 110 Farr. For more than an hour. The spores get into your air conditioning ducts and spread through the house so make sure you have HEPA filters in your air conditioning units. Bleach the house with 10 to 1 bleach solution and it has to be bleach, Lysol won't kill the spores. Bleach the walls, any surface that can be wiped with bleach, do it. Let the bleach air dry. Your cat should be on an antifungal it is called a fungicide. We started off with itraconazole but our cat was resistive to it. We then went to Lamisil oral and it worked great. It took her 5 months to have three negative fungal cultures. You need to have three negative fungal cultures before you let the cat free in the house especially if you have other cats or you will have a contaminated house and the cat will be sure to get it again. Each culture is done one month from the last. We kept ours in a very large dog crate in a closet that did not have an air duct. We taped the air ducts shut that were in the room the cat was in. The cage was wire and easily wiped down with the bleach solution. I cleaned it every day because if the cat is shedding spores they can reinfect due to their environment being contaminated. YOU HAVE TO BATHE THEM 3 times a week with lime sulfur. You can buy this on amazon. The bottle will tell you how to mix it. Wear gloves and change your clothes after handling the kitten. I am a nurse in the critical care unit. I work with highly contagious illness and bacteria. I used my knowledge of resistive illnesses to guide me in my care of this cat. I wore disposable gloves that I bought at a health store, I wore disposable towns that I there away after every contact with the cat. I wore a hair net because you can get ringworm in your scalp. Even after all this protection I still had ring worm in three spots and had to get on lamisil oral medication my self for 3 months. I was able to keep my other two cats free from the ringworm, my kids and husband never got it. Once resolved I had all the cats cultures and everyone was negative. We then moved, not because of the ringworm but because of other things. This cat had to be rehomed. When she was allowed out of the crate she would bite my kids. She had had no exposure to kids and was very stressed out. She was a beautiful Ragdoll that was from a breeder. The breeder refused to assist me. Good luck, it was a nightmare and took a lot of persistence and hard work but if you don't clean your environment and disinfect with bleach your kitten will likely get it again, not to mention you and others in your family. Please pm me with any questions. The topical creams do nothing for the cats. Don't waste your money. The medication is dosed based in weight so they have to be weighed every two weeks and the medication adjusted for their new weight.

I did a lot of reading of veterinary studies found online not just veterinary sites but actual journals that had published studies on ringworm it is called a dermatophyte and the use of certain medications and certain disinfectants for the environment. I learned that it takes approximately 30-95 days for a cat to be decontaminated, that the ringworm grows according to the phases of hair growth. You have to be careful because even after you treat the cat, the next phase of hair growth can stimulate a dormant spore and then its back to square one. This is why you need so many cultures to get you through each hair growth phase. Most cats though just respond as they are supposed to and are cured. A long haired cat has more trouble clearing it. I cannot emphasize enough the benefits of isolating the cat and cleaning the environment. VACUUM LIKE CRAZY!! 10 MINUTES PER AREA. we had a dyson that had a filter and I bleached it once a week as well. Make sure the oral med your vet gave You is a fungiCIDAL not just an antifungal. You want this stuff killed not just dormant. Take your cat outside on a leash to play with it but wear a smock or a disposable gown when you snuggle with it. DONT SCRATCH YOUR SKN AND WASH WASH WASH YOUR HANDS!! hope this helps.

Your vet gave you sporanox which is the same thing as itraconazole but you should have it compounded into a liquid form and squirt it in its mouth. It is weight dosed and has to be adjusted per weight gain. YOU HAVE DO BATHE IT WITH LIME SULFUR OR MALASEB. You can get those on amazon. The whole idea is to first disinfect your whole environment and then keep it clean by constantly keeping him as clean as you can.

Thanks for your great reply balibabies. This is going to be interesting. Fortunately, it's only the cat and me living together. I've only had Jasper a week and a half and just can't bring myself to isolate him. This is all really quite depressing. The vet only advised me to wash my hands after handling him and to take care of any scratches I have. I got pretty much the same advice from the lady at the pet store today. That's really interesting about the cycle of hair growth - I can understand now why there is no quick fix. I can't see how I could bleach my house without ruining most surfaces. I'm renting, so I need to take care of floors and paint. It's an old house and I think it's inconceivable that I can get rid of the spores from every crevice (and there's a lot!). I was getting ready to give up in despair and have been reading so much info on the net (not helping the worry, that's for sure!). Anyway, I came across a veterinary disinfectant called F10 and ordered some. It's supposed to be non-toxic and safe for most surfaces. I will be spraying that everywhere when it arrives. In the meantime, I am taking a few precautions (lots of laundry, hand washing, antifungal cream on my face and hands) but I am pretty much resigned to getting it somewhere on me. So far, so good. I haven't seen any more patches on Jasper so I'm crossing my fingers the medicine is working. Three 'lesions' appeared the night before taking him to the vet so I'm relieved it hasn't kept multiplying. The medicine was dosed to his weight, but it's not perfectly measured I agree. I am taking him back in just under three weeks for a check up and his next vaccination. I will ask the vet if the dose needs to be adjusted again. Thanks again for taking the time to give such a detailed reply.

Your welcome, I hope it all goes well for you.

Ah Ringworm. I know it all too well. Thankfully it's not fatal but it is a major pain to get rid of! 

I did a search for you of some older threads so read through some of these. It will give you some good tips on how to eradicate it from your house. I especially like the one "Ringworm Wars." It takes awhile but if you are patient and diligent you guys will get through it! 

http://www.thecatsite.com/newsearch?search=Ringworm

Good luck! 

Last summer, my dog brought ringworm into the house from daycare. She and my 5 cats all had it. On the dog and 2 of the cats, treating the spots with Tenactin was sufficient. For the other 3 cats, my vet prescribed Griseofulvin in a compounded liquid from a special pet pharmacy. They were on that for 3 months - thank God it was palatable and I could sneak it into wet food. I also did topical treatments on them and the others for an additional 30 days after the last and 3rd culture came in negative. As for household items - I tossed everything that couldn't be washed in scalding hot water or bleached. That included my drapes, rugs, pet beds, soft toys, blankets, comforters, pillows, etc. My carpets had to be steam cleaned several times - buy yourself a Shark steam cleaner. I used bleach 10-1 bleach solution on all hard surfaces, including leather furniture. I was fortunate and got rid of it in 4 months - with 6 animals having ringworm (2 cats are Maine Coons and the dog is a Pomeranian mix), I'm told that was a minor miracle.

It took a lot of hard work cleaning and it cost me a lot of money to replace things and the prescriptions weren't cheap either. Good luck and I hope you can get rid of it soon.

Fosters-r-Us said:

 I was fortunate and got rid of it in 4 months - with 6 animals having ringworm (2 cats are Maine Coons and the dog is a Pomeranian mix), I'm told that was a minor miracle.

It took a lot of hard work cleaning and it cost me a lot of money to replace things and the prescriptions weren't cheap either. Good luck and I hope you can get rid of it soon.

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Haha yes that is a miracle! It took me 4 months to get rid of it too but I just had one kitten and a one bedroom apartment to deal with! In my defense she had other health problems going on so I had to go slow with her and couldn't start the meds until some of her other ailments had cleared up. But still, 4 months with 6 infected, WOW........ 

Your advice is super sound. I did the Griseofulvin too as well as the 1:10 bleach solution. It does work it just takes time.