Some of you have seen my multiple posts about my cat and his food allergies. I'm not going to type up all that we've done, but we've done everything imaginable for him. He has FOOD allergies, NOT inhaled allergies. He's strictly an indoor cat. My question pertains to what I should do for him.
Depomedrol keeps him stable, and stops him from itching his ears and chin to the point that he's bleeding. Depomedrol is a cortosone shot, and as we know steroids can cause Diabetes. I work in a vet clinic, so cost will never be a problem for me when it comes to shots and whatever I may need for him in the future.
My question is, what should I do? Should I put him on the steroid shots every couple of months, whenever the itching occurs and risk diabetes? or do I let him itch himself into oblivian? I mean, he gets to the point where he has no whiskers and no hair on his chin/ears and he gets goop inside of them. It's a complete chore to clean his ears because he hates it. Food wise he still itches and his right hear gets bad when he's on the rabbit, which I have him on now. With the depo and the rabbit he's itch free. If he were on a complete food the depo wouldn't make a difference.
I just don't know what to do. I don't think it's fair to him to make him suffer being itchy all the time, but I don't want him to be diabetic. I asked my boss/vet what he would do if Napolean was his cat, he said he would do the shot to keep him comfortable, which keeping him comfortable seems to be all I can do for him.
I just really need some advice because I don't know what to do for him anymore. He needs something because if we do more food trials he'll need something to calm the reactions down.
Just FYI for everyone he's only 13 months old. He's had food allergies since I adopted him at 12 weeks of age, and I suspect he was born with this problem.
Depomedrol keeps him stable, and stops him from itching his ears and chin to the point that he's bleeding. Depomedrol is a cortosone shot, and as we know steroids can cause Diabetes. I work in a vet clinic, so cost will never be a problem for me when it comes to shots and whatever I may need for him in the future.
My question is, what should I do? Should I put him on the steroid shots every couple of months, whenever the itching occurs and risk diabetes? or do I let him itch himself into oblivian? I mean, he gets to the point where he has no whiskers and no hair on his chin/ears and he gets goop inside of them. It's a complete chore to clean his ears because he hates it. Food wise he still itches and his right hear gets bad when he's on the rabbit, which I have him on now. With the depo and the rabbit he's itch free. If he were on a complete food the depo wouldn't make a difference.
I just don't know what to do. I don't think it's fair to him to make him suffer being itchy all the time, but I don't want him to be diabetic. I asked my boss/vet what he would do if Napolean was his cat, he said he would do the shot to keep him comfortable, which keeping him comfortable seems to be all I can do for him.
I just really need some advice because I don't know what to do for him anymore. He needs something because if we do more food trials he'll need something to calm the reactions down.
Just FYI for everyone he's only 13 months old. He's had food allergies since I adopted him at 12 weeks of age, and I suspect he was born with this problem.