I have been caring for my fip cat for the past 2 months. It involved many episodes of pilling and recently, forced/assisted feeding which I have tried to make more pleasant. I hope other worried carers will find some of these methods helpful and reduce the trauma for cat and carer 
(a) Pilling- I used a pinch of a slice of bread and pressed it around the pill, making sure that all of the pill is covered. Dip it in water, gravy with a bit of tasty food just before pilling in the usual way.
The thin layer of pressed bread around the pill blocks the bad taste of the pill so that my cat couldn't taste it when swallowing AND covers the sharp edges of cut pills so that it wouldn't scratch the throat. It also allows for a good grip and some handling of the covered pill unlike a bit of cheese etc which often falls off too easily. The water/gravy made it smoother for swallowing so that the pill wouldn't get stuck in the throat or somewhere down the gullet (pills have been known to cause inflammation of the mucous membranes if they get stuck or remain too long on the mucous membranes of the gullet). Dip in water/gravy with food shortly before pilling to avoid the bread mushing up and pill dissolving and releasing the bad taste. The advantage of bread is that it will disintegrate easily in the stomach fluids leaving the pill to do its work.
My cat swallows his pills without scratching me or foaming with this method
(b) Forced/Assisted feeding - I tried many non-invasive methods i.e. buffet of various flavours for kitty to choose with much wastage. I found syringe feeding to be very messy and traumatic for both cat and myself and was desperate for my cat to eat as he had become very weak after a recent UTI. However, these couple of methods have gotten a decent amount of wet food into him these past 3 days:
Food ball - e.g Applaws tuna with cheese can be mashed and rolled into little balls that can hold their shape. Feed as though pilling the kitty. Food must be mashed before rolling into balls.
'Canapes' - for food that cannot hold their shape: press quarter inch squares of bread into the shape of shell pasta (with a tiny handle with which we can pick up the 'canape'), fill with the food. Feed as though pilling.
With poor appetite, I suspect my cat did not like the taste of food all over his tongue. So when the food balls/canapes were dropped to the back of the mouth, he was ok with swallowing it without any mess; unlike syringe feeding where the food was all over the tongue and mouth and he kept spitting it out, leading to much cleaning up of his chin and whiskers etc, adding to the traumatic process.
From being very weak three days ago, he was able to walk about with tail up today.
I apologise for the lengthy post. I just wanted to reach out to worried and desperate (like what I was feeling) kitty carers some ideas that may help them. Thanks for reading
(a) Pilling- I used a pinch of a slice of bread and pressed it around the pill, making sure that all of the pill is covered. Dip it in water, gravy with a bit of tasty food just before pilling in the usual way.
The thin layer of pressed bread around the pill blocks the bad taste of the pill so that my cat couldn't taste it when swallowing AND covers the sharp edges of cut pills so that it wouldn't scratch the throat. It also allows for a good grip and some handling of the covered pill unlike a bit of cheese etc which often falls off too easily. The water/gravy made it smoother for swallowing so that the pill wouldn't get stuck in the throat or somewhere down the gullet (pills have been known to cause inflammation of the mucous membranes if they get stuck or remain too long on the mucous membranes of the gullet). Dip in water/gravy with food shortly before pilling to avoid the bread mushing up and pill dissolving and releasing the bad taste. The advantage of bread is that it will disintegrate easily in the stomach fluids leaving the pill to do its work.
My cat swallows his pills without scratching me or foaming with this method
(b) Forced/Assisted feeding - I tried many non-invasive methods i.e. buffet of various flavours for kitty to choose with much wastage. I found syringe feeding to be very messy and traumatic for both cat and myself and was desperate for my cat to eat as he had become very weak after a recent UTI. However, these couple of methods have gotten a decent amount of wet food into him these past 3 days:
Food ball - e.g Applaws tuna with cheese can be mashed and rolled into little balls that can hold their shape. Feed as though pilling the kitty. Food must be mashed before rolling into balls.
'Canapes' - for food that cannot hold their shape: press quarter inch squares of bread into the shape of shell pasta (with a tiny handle with which we can pick up the 'canape'), fill with the food. Feed as though pilling.
With poor appetite, I suspect my cat did not like the taste of food all over his tongue. So when the food balls/canapes were dropped to the back of the mouth, he was ok with swallowing it without any mess; unlike syringe feeding where the food was all over the tongue and mouth and he kept spitting it out, leading to much cleaning up of his chin and whiskers etc, adding to the traumatic process.
From being very weak three days ago, he was able to walk about with tail up today.
I apologise for the lengthy post. I just wanted to reach out to worried and desperate (like what I was feeling) kitty carers some ideas that may help them. Thanks for reading
