After Cat Barf-a-thon and vet visit, how long til recovery?

[Craigary]

Our Finn went from happy and frisky to literally a day later not keeping anything down. We have a wonderful home vet who came and checked him out, said it seemed like a pancreatitis flare up brought on by something he ate (tainted food? We’re not sure). We gave him Gabapentin for the vet as they’d requested that to make it easier to give him everything. Anyway they gave him fluids and Pepcid and the works, said to try to give him some bland homemade food last night which I tried but he wasn’t interested.

Anyway he’s still super wobbly this morning, can’t really get around, well after gabap wore off, but we’re assuming it’s due to not eating for two days (I’d be wobbly too!) So we gave him the anti nausea/anti emetic med this morning as prescribed and are buying (bland stage 1) baby food.

Qs:
Anything else we should do to get him less wobbly or just gradually reintroducing food as we can should eventually perk him up?

how long has it typically taken your cat in very similar situation to start feeling better?

he’s 8 and was as I said very strong happy and perky just 2.5 days ago. Now he’s acting like my 19 year old cat did when he could barely function. (Cry)

 

[Craigary]

PS the food we gave him - that our other cat didn’t want — was a new shipment of weruva canned chicken and pumpkin, usually fine but wondering if something else was off this time or maybe it was something else he ate but usually he’s very good about not eating random crap off the floor.
Also the vet said she felt no obstruction in his intestine, noting that it’s harder to feel if it was something on his stomach, that would require X ray, but more often a blockage will be in intestines.

 

[fionasmom]

Most pancreatitis in cats is from non specific causes although there could be some triggers. It may not have been the food, but of course you have to determine if you think it might be and not feed that batch again. In dogs, there are definite triggers like fatty foods, but in cats this is not the case.

Did the vet do any specific testing to rule in pancreatitis? Very often it is diagnosed from observational symptoms, but there is a specific test for it (fPLI) which can be done as a SNAP or Spec version. The latter is sent to a lab and is more reliable. Pancreatic enzymes can also be tested but can return as negative even in a cat who has this.

If it is not pancreatitis, then the cause of whatever is going on is still TBD. From your description, Finn is not exactly responding to the treatment which is concerning. Yes, it could be pancreatitis and my experience with that is that it can take a couple of days to start to see improvement. I am assuming that this happened yesterday, but if he is refusing food and not coming around a little bit you need to let the vet know. The next step from pancreatitis when there is a refusal to eat can be hepatic lipidosis.

Fluids are important as he cannot get dehydrated. I am wondering if he needs Cerenia and/or mirtazapine. Definitely try the baby food like Gerbers stage 2 meats.

Any Good Tips To Get Your Cats To Eat? Share Them Here!
This thread has suggestions for helping a cat to eat, but use caution as some may not be suitable for Finn right now.

If he continues to refuse to eat, you have to let the vet know today.