Will tramadol make a cat sleepy and affect her quality of life?

My 16 year old girl is going in for xrays tomorrow as steroids and metacam have stopped working for what the vet believed to be arthritis, the vet wants to see if it is anything more sinister before putting her onto tramadol for pain management.

My question / worry being, will tramadol make her sleepy and reduce her quality of life instead of improving it?  does anyone have any experience from their kitties being on tramadol?

Thank for any advice :-)

This might depend on the cat, just as side effects differ from human to human. My cat didn't show any increased sleepiness or lethargy when he was on it for arthritis but the vet warned me he might. You might want to just try this and see - you can always discontinue if it seems too much for him. In my case I discontinued because it didn't seem to help him any, but again, your cat might be different.