Has/is anyone using Transdermal gel Prednisone for their cats?

We had never heard of it until a month ago. Gizmo has had bad allergy problems since he was a baby. We have gone round and round trying unsuccessfully to find a good treatment for him.

A month ago our vet suggested we try this product and it seems to be working. We have now gone 2-1/2 months breakout free! We started with 5mg daily wiped on the inside of his ear. We are now cutting back to 2.75 to see how that goes. Keep working down until he has a breakout, then we know we have to go back up a tad to find his magic dosage. We don't want him getting more than he needs, but enough to maintain him not breaking out, itching and becoming raw and inflamed, necessitating an anti biotic.

We also found out that with the shots he was getting about every 6 weeks (20mg per shot) he was heading toward diabetes. We switched his food to Hills Prescription WD for glucose management, administered meds daily and he levels are back to normal in a month.

After 6 years, we might be on the right road!

Has anyone used this? What experiences have you had with it long or short term?

Does it work the same as the oral prednisolone or does less get absorbed?

Right now my cat is getting sprayed with topical hydrocortisone spray. It has healed up his neck wounds nicely but he is still slightly itchy and cannot have his E collar off.

Prednisolone oral makes him strain to urinate so is not an option.

Sarah Ann said:

Does it work the same as the oral prednisolone or does less get absorbed?

Right now my cat is getting sprayed with topical hydrocortisone spray. It has healed up his neck wounds nicely but he is still slightly itchy and cannot have his E collar off.

Prednisolone oral makes him strain to urinate so is not an option.

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According to our vet, it gets absorbed very well and from the results thus far, that seems to be true. What we are using is a "pen" that you turn releasing the measured amount of gel. You them simply massage the gel into the inside of the ear...not into the ear canal but on the inside of the tip,of the ear. Sine most cats life being rubbed in the ear, this is just a real treat. Also, being put in the ear, he cannot lick it off.

Hello all, This thread is almost 5 years old, but I can't find any other forum posts regarding prednisolone transdermal. My cat Bolder is 10 years old and has been diagnosed with either IBD or lymphoma. He is extremely difficult to pill so we have been using transdermal prednisolone from a compounding pharmacy for about 1 month. It has not worked for him. Has anyone else used it with success?

sheila0 said:

Hello all, This thread is almost 5 years old, but I can't find any other forum posts regarding prednisolone transdermal. My cat Bolder is 10 years old and has been diagnosed with either IBD or lymphoma. He is extremely difficult to pill so we have been using transdermal prednisolone from a compounding pharmacy for about 1 month. It has not worked for him. Has anyone else used it with success?

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My cat was hard to pill and would vomit up the pill. So I have been using the pred transdermal gel for only about a week, but I have to say that I am skeptical of this method and the absorption rate. We are also using Cerenia transdermal gel (anti-vomiting drug), so we have one drug in each ear! I suspect the Cerenia is helping more than the pred, but I can’t prove it yet, since my cat is on both drugs. (The Cerenia injection is very effective in my cat.)

Even though the cat can’t directly lick it off, the cat can remove the gel. My cat will rub her paw over her ear to clean it off, then lick her paw. Sneaky. She might be eating it this way instead, but this method just seems unreliable in general. For the next dose, I am going to try putting a cone collar on my cat for at least an hour, so that she can’t immediatel clean the gel off.

Your cat shouldn’t be able to clean the hairless part of the inside of her ear but if she does she may be better off because we know that pred is absorbed well when it goes through the gut. I didn’t know that cerenia works as a transdermal. We’re using transdermal mirtazapine for appetite stimulation, and it works really well. It seems to help with nausea as well (just my observation). I knew the mirtazapine was helping him and not the pred because he was eating but not grooming or doing his usual behaviors. He was hungry but still not feeling well. Today we started with dexamethasone liquid from the compounding pharmacy. I was so nervous that he would get mad and struggle, but it was completely uneventful. He was in his bed resting, with some drool on his chin so the poor guy has nausea. I gave him the mirtazapine, then I measured the dexamethasone dose into a syringe. With my finger, I found the space behind the canine tooth (Bolder likes to have his gums rubbed, but this space is about where the last whisker root is). Then I put the syringe there. He recoiled a bit, as if startled, but he relaxed right away and opened his mouth slightly. I advanced the tip of the syringe just a tad into the space and slowly squirted the 0.5 ml in his mouth (it’s less than 1/8 teaspoon so it’s a very small amount). He swallowed it without a fuss. Then I gave him some Churu treat. Baby food (just meat) is better for them and most cats love it but unfortunately Bolder doesn’t. I tasted the Dexamethasone residue that was left in the syringe and it was not nearly as bitter as the pred, but I didn’t taste the chicken flavor that the compounder put in it. I only hope he doesn’t struggle tomorrow when I put the syringe in his mouth, now that he knows what it is. We have to do 5 days in a row and then twice a week thereafter. We are also giving him subQ vitamin b12 shots once per week. A troubling new development is that he has episodes where he walks in circles for about a half hour. The vet said these are seizures and that steroids are the treatment for these too.

larsan said:

We had never heard of it until a month ago. Gizmo has had bad allergy problems since he was a baby. We have gone round and round trying unsuccessfully to find a good treatment for him.

A month ago our vet suggested we try this product and it seems to be working. We have now gone 2-1/2 months breakout free! We started with 5mg daily wiped on the inside of his ear. We are now cutting back to 2.75 to see how that goes. Keep working down until he has a breakout, then we know we have to go back up a tad to find his magic dosage. We don't want him getting more than he needs, but enough to maintain him not breaking out, itching and becoming raw and inflamed, necessitating an anti biotic.

We also found out that with the shots he was getting about every 6 weeks (20mg per shot) he was heading toward diabetes. We switched his food to Hills Prescription WD for glucose management, administered meds daily and he levels are back to normal in a month.

After 6 years, we might be on the right road!

Has anyone used this? What experiences have you had with it long or short term?

Click to expand...

Yes, it's a good medication as you probably know now. The one thing about drugs that have to be compounded is watch the pharmacy you use. That's the key to good compounding. Not all pharmacies are made a like.