Cats paws keep getting dry and mildly flakey.

[vsvpflex]

My cat has had issues with his paws for a while, at one point even chewing them raw. He’s on low dose prednisolone for allergies and since we started that, he had refrained from chewing his paws. The rawness healed up and they look like healthy normal paws again, but they get dry very quickly. We were regularly balming them but it seemed to make things worse. Think how when people over-use chapstick, it makes it so their lips dry out bad if they don’t use it, it’s kind of seeming like that kind of scenario. We haven’t been blaming and things seem some better. If they appear dusty or dry, I have been wiping them with a warm/damp washcloth and it’s kept his paws pretty good, but not perfect. He gets these little creases in his pads that almost resemble how fingerprints are on our fingers, and occasionally his feet will be mildly flakey. We supplement him with salmon oil in his food to help with skin dryness, but aside from that I’m unsure if anyone had any tips. Everything online says to balm them, and that has been counterproductive for us. Has anyone else dealt with this? Are there any tips or tricks I don’t know about? A deficiency that could be causing this? Something I could supplement to help? My cats refuse to use non clay litter so we switched over to the doctor elseys dust free, but aside from this I’m kind of at a loss of what to do. As I said, we’ve been keeping the dryness at bay, but it’s required me doing the warm water cleanings on his paws 2-3 times a day, and while I don’t mind doing it, I’d rather a solution that didn’t involve me constantly having to bug him and fidget with his feet since it’s not his favorite thing ever

 

[FeebysOwner]

It could be the type of balm you have used - not all have the exact same ingredients in them. Otherwise, you can try olive oil, coconut oil - even the salmon oil that you put in his food - of course, that will not stop the need to fidget with his feet. The only other thing I have heard about is a zinc deficiency, so maybe ask your vet about that.

Hopefully other members will come along soon with additional suggestions.

 

[vsvpflex]

It could be the type of balm you have used - not all have the exact same ingredients in them. Otherwise, you can try olive oil, coconut oil - even the salmon oil that you put in his food - of course, that will not stop the need to fidget with his feet. The only other thing I have heard about is a zinc deficiency, so maybe ask your vet about that.

Hopefully other members will come along soon with additional suggestions.

these are the ingredients in the balm, so I don’t think it’d be the balm causing problems

 

[vsvpflex]

Figured I’d also include a photo, this photo was from when he was still chewing his feet, so the red/irritated areas are no longer there or an issue, but this is what his feet look like when dry