Skin Allergies

My cat is 13 years old.  He suffers from skin allergies.  Currently he has been on Atopica for cats for 5 years. 

Does anyone have experience with this medication?

He seems to be getting used to it & he is getting more & more thin spots in his fur.  Also I have had to cut his doses in half.  He was on the 11 lb dose every 2-3 days, mostly 3 days.  He began to vomit last week 3 nights in a row.  I cut him back to a half dose every 2 days this week & he was fine except still tugging at his fur some.

Thanks for the information.

Stella

The skin allergy (itching, rashes, etc) be a result of an allergy / sensitivity to something in the food. Has the vet ever discussed this possibility with you? I think there is a test the vet can do to determine if your cat has a food allergy / sensitivity. What do you feed to your cat?

Yes. He's been under a vets care since 2006 when I adopted him. We finally eliminated food allergies. He was on rx food for years. Now he's on science diet age defying & now has firm stools. Just wondering what other kitty owners experiences were with the med Atopica for Cats. It's made by Novartis & can only be gotten by vet rx. Thanks for your input, As Bocephous ages all information is valuable.

Atopica isn't made by Novartis Animal Health anymore. Elanco / Eili Lilly bought the Novarits Animal Health division last year. Looks like there is a rebate you can get: http://us.atopica.com/en/#

I found some old TCS threads on using Atopica: http://www.thecatsite.com/newsearch?search=atopica

Cool. That will help alot. Its about $300 a year. Thanks!

My kitty just started Atopica. BOY it's hard to get them to take, isn't it?

The first few times I gave it to him, my kitty didn't throw up or have litter issues, but he got very, very nauseous. I knew to look out for tummy issues, because our vet had warned us. When we first got the medicine, I would mix it with just a little baby food (chicken or turkey flavour, make sure it doesn't have onion or garlic)-- but I guess his tummy was still too empty. Our vet said the more empty the stomach, the harder the medicine is to tolerate. Now he is taking a halved dose (which is MICROSCOPIC, 4lb dose [our cat is 7 pounds]) and it is a long drawn out game of mixing it into whatever he eats. I still mix the medicine into some baby food, so I can have a visual of where it is in the bowl, put his wet food on top of it-- then I pour the juice from the wet food on top of that AND mix in some dried chicken pieces. He still manages to take a bite and let it all fall out of his mouth. I can't believe he can still sense the medicine in there! The dose is the size of my pinkie fingernail! 

But I will say, he hasn't had any stomach issues since taking the medicine with a lot of food. I think every day he takes it he does look a little better. The skin in his armpit and back legs were RAW when we started but now, there are no sores! That's why I am willing to keep going with it.

It seems like it would be more challenging if your little one has food allergies. Our cat has some sort of severe seasonal allergy we haven't figured out yet, so we have some liberties when it comes to mixing in other treats. We also had luck with tuna juice in a pinch.

But yeah! We don't have tons of experience, but so far my discoveries when it came to upset Atopica tummy were making sure he gets it with food. Really seems to help. Our vet also recommended the lower dose and slowly raising it week by week possible. That helped immensely too. I have no idea how we'll ever get up to the full dose, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there-- hopefully his flare up will be over and maybe we can stop, hahaha.