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- Feb 23, 2015
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This morning I took the 5 week old, Pots, to the vet, and he's now on the mend. I decided to make a post about him and the other 3 foster kitties I have so it can potentially help someone else. Of course, he was seemingly at the brink of death in the middle of the night, Since I had to wait for the vet to open, I got a lot of help from reading these forums.
We picked up Pots just over a week ago from a kind man who found the kitten at his job. When we picked him up, he was as healthy as can be. He rolled around the box he was kept in, thoroughly enjoying any attention he got. He was still healthy a couple of days later, when a rescue found similarly-aged, similar-looking kittens in the same area. We thought it could be the same litter. Nope. These kittens were maybe 5 days to a week older. We took them in anyway, because they seemed healthy, if not a little skinny. They consisted of a mostly black girl, and two twin tuxedo boys. We call both of those boys Bradley, because we can't tell the difference between them.
They are identical! The rescue gave me the kittens, and two bottles of meds: Albon if they get diarrhea, and Strongid, for the coming weeks when we need to deworm them.
Now we were up to 4 kittens, all around the 5-6 week mark. The next day into having the 4, I notice that Pots has a pretty bloated belly, and the others are slightly bloated. I recognize it as worm belly and give them the Strongid that night. I also start noticing some rancid, but normally colored soft stools from Pots and one of the Bradleys. The Albon they gave me wasn't even enough for 10 single doses, but I decide to start them off anyway, under the assumption that I could get some more. I give Albon to all of the kittens. In two days I see marked improvement in the bloating. All this time the kittens are voracious eaters, and the 3 from the shelter start putting on weight. I'm feeding them KMR 2nd step, some powdered KMR formula, constituted with pedialyte, and science diet for kitten mixed into a paste. However, the days go on, and the diarrhea continues. I'm starting to worry, but the rescue assured me that the vet wasn't necessary yet, that they could give me some meds first. I plan to meet one of the rescuers to get some more meds that day. She gives me Panacur, Flagyl, and more Albon, but tells me to hold off on the Albon until we see how they do with the other two. I agree to do that, because at this point the kittens are all lively, eating, and peeing just fine. However, when I get home from getting those meds, I see that poor Pots is being just a bit more sleepy than usual, and his poop went from just smelling terrible to also being clear/white and mucusy. I was finding a few normal, formed poops, but Pots and probably one of the Bradleys had the white diarrhea, though I never caught the Bradleys in the act.
I give them the Panacur and the flagyl that afternoon. Now, I have actually had C. diff myself 2 times, so I knew flagyl. It has the most BITTER taste, and it almost makes you feel worse while you're on it.
But I knew it was good for wiping out lower GI bugs and helping with inflammation. I was highly alarmed at the white diarrhea, but since little Pots was still eating I tried to give flagyl a chance to work before rushing to the vet. I continue to monitor him. At around 9 pm, I see that Pots had vomited EVERYWHERE. He also had several bouts of more white diarrhea outside of the box. The poor kid is now pretty lethargic, and I offer the kittens some food. The 3 eat slowly, like they aren't really interested, and Pots just avoids it all together. I rush to my old trick of giving them saturated sugar water with a syringe. I feed them again and he eats. (I've done this with a lot of kittens on the brink, it's good for giving them the energy to get up and eat) However, he feels hot to the touch, and poop is just falling out of him. He seems kind of confused, and he sits hunched down like he's miserable.
I resolve to take him to the vet first thing in the morning, but at this point it was 1 a.m., and I needed to wait until 8 to call them. (the only emergency vet nearby is Animerge, and I had a really awful experience with them in the past, never going back) So in the meantime, unable to sleep, I just research everything I can about his symptoms. I am hoping that its coccidia at this point, and I'm aiming to get some Ponazuril so this boy can start feeling better quickly. But I start seeing feline distemper coming up in my search results, and Pots is starting to seem so bad that I am seriously worrying about it. Did I just expose 3 healthy kittens to a panleuk kitten? The 3 kittens are already exposed, I figured, so I kept them all together anyway. I think Pots needed them, they never left him alone the whole night. The hours went by, and I continued to pump fluids in him, and he isn't throwing up any more, just letting out that awful, terrible, mucusy white diarrhea. He isn't getting worse, but he isn't getting better either. He just curled in my lap and slept.
8 a.m. rolls around, and I get an appointment for 10:30. By this time, I am doubting distemper, because he's still able to walk around and shows interest in food. He is also able to swallow when I syringe some sugar water in him. As I understood from my research, once they start showing symptoms they go pretty quickly. But, it's still on my radar. I take them to the vet, and we weigh them. Pots had lost about .25 lb since I weighed him 2 days previous. Pots is kind enough to give us a stool sample right on the exam table, and just looking under the microscope the vet immediately sees extensive coccidia and a whole lot of other bad bugs. With that, she gives me the Ponazuril, a flavored flagyl that should not make them vomit, a probiotic, diagel (holy heck this stuff is expensive, $42!!!!), plain yogurt to add to meals and tells me to continue the panacur, just in case. All of this, with the exception of the diagel, is for all 4 kittens. It's not been about 6 hours since I gave the Ponazuril and they got everything else. Pots and the others had several bowel movements, but no more white!
It's now a normal brown color, but still very mucusy for Pots and one of the Bradleys. He's already seeming much better, and at their most recent meal, they all ate everything I gave them. The current food setup is: small amount of powdered formula, KMR 2nd step, turkey baby food, pedialyte, fortiflora, and some plain yogurt. I'm also constantly scrubbing walls and floors and dishes and litter boxes with a 1:10 bleach solution. It's exhausting! Of course, we're still waiting on the fecal sample results, and we'll see how well the treatment goes, but I am feeling pretty confident that he and the others will pull through.
Wow, this got long. I hope someone searching some of the keywords here finds this helpful. Lesson learned: trust your instincts and go to the vet BEFORE the poop turns white.
I do have one question though. Anyone have kittens on any of these meds and notice they are a little more wobbly? I feel like these guys lost a bit of coordination in the past couple of days. They aren't tumbling around like a kitten with cerebellar hypoplasia, but they just seem a little off compared to any other kittens I've had of the same age.
We picked up Pots just over a week ago from a kind man who found the kitten at his job. When we picked him up, he was as healthy as can be. He rolled around the box he was kept in, thoroughly enjoying any attention he got. He was still healthy a couple of days later, when a rescue found similarly-aged, similar-looking kittens in the same area. We thought it could be the same litter. Nope. These kittens were maybe 5 days to a week older. We took them in anyway, because they seemed healthy, if not a little skinny. They consisted of a mostly black girl, and two twin tuxedo boys. We call both of those boys Bradley, because we can't tell the difference between them.
Now we were up to 4 kittens, all around the 5-6 week mark. The next day into having the 4, I notice that Pots has a pretty bloated belly, and the others are slightly bloated. I recognize it as worm belly and give them the Strongid that night. I also start noticing some rancid, but normally colored soft stools from Pots and one of the Bradleys. The Albon they gave me wasn't even enough for 10 single doses, but I decide to start them off anyway, under the assumption that I could get some more. I give Albon to all of the kittens. In two days I see marked improvement in the bloating. All this time the kittens are voracious eaters, and the 3 from the shelter start putting on weight. I'm feeding them KMR 2nd step, some powdered KMR formula, constituted with pedialyte, and science diet for kitten mixed into a paste. However, the days go on, and the diarrhea continues. I'm starting to worry, but the rescue assured me that the vet wasn't necessary yet, that they could give me some meds first. I plan to meet one of the rescuers to get some more meds that day. She gives me Panacur, Flagyl, and more Albon, but tells me to hold off on the Albon until we see how they do with the other two. I agree to do that, because at this point the kittens are all lively, eating, and peeing just fine. However, when I get home from getting those meds, I see that poor Pots is being just a bit more sleepy than usual, and his poop went from just smelling terrible to also being clear/white and mucusy. I was finding a few normal, formed poops, but Pots and probably one of the Bradleys had the white diarrhea, though I never caught the Bradleys in the act.
I give them the Panacur and the flagyl that afternoon. Now, I have actually had C. diff myself 2 times, so I knew flagyl. It has the most BITTER taste, and it almost makes you feel worse while you're on it.
I resolve to take him to the vet first thing in the morning, but at this point it was 1 a.m., and I needed to wait until 8 to call them. (the only emergency vet nearby is Animerge, and I had a really awful experience with them in the past, never going back) So in the meantime, unable to sleep, I just research everything I can about his symptoms. I am hoping that its coccidia at this point, and I'm aiming to get some Ponazuril so this boy can start feeling better quickly. But I start seeing feline distemper coming up in my search results, and Pots is starting to seem so bad that I am seriously worrying about it. Did I just expose 3 healthy kittens to a panleuk kitten? The 3 kittens are already exposed, I figured, so I kept them all together anyway. I think Pots needed them, they never left him alone the whole night. The hours went by, and I continued to pump fluids in him, and he isn't throwing up any more, just letting out that awful, terrible, mucusy white diarrhea. He isn't getting worse, but he isn't getting better either. He just curled in my lap and slept.
8 a.m. rolls around, and I get an appointment for 10:30. By this time, I am doubting distemper, because he's still able to walk around and shows interest in food. He is also able to swallow when I syringe some sugar water in him. As I understood from my research, once they start showing symptoms they go pretty quickly. But, it's still on my radar. I take them to the vet, and we weigh them. Pots had lost about .25 lb since I weighed him 2 days previous. Pots is kind enough to give us a stool sample right on the exam table, and just looking under the microscope the vet immediately sees extensive coccidia and a whole lot of other bad bugs. With that, she gives me the Ponazuril, a flavored flagyl that should not make them vomit, a probiotic, diagel (holy heck this stuff is expensive, $42!!!!), plain yogurt to add to meals and tells me to continue the panacur, just in case. All of this, with the exception of the diagel, is for all 4 kittens. It's not been about 6 hours since I gave the Ponazuril and they got everything else. Pots and the others had several bowel movements, but no more white!
Wow, this got long. I hope someone searching some of the keywords here finds this helpful. Lesson learned: trust your instincts and go to the vet BEFORE the poop turns white.
I do have one question though. Anyone have kittens on any of these meds and notice they are a little more wobbly? I feel like these guys lost a bit of coordination in the past couple of days. They aren't tumbling around like a kitten with cerebellar hypoplasia, but they just seem a little off compared to any other kittens I've had of the same age.
