Male Cat pees on floor, but poops in box

[karenmf]

I have a 12 year old male cat who has either a really bad IBS or cancer (I chose not to do surgery to find out for sure, but a needle biopsy did detect some cancer cells). He has been sick for just about a year now, with the major symptoms being diarrhea and weight loss. He is on 10mg of prednisone/day. The pred is not doing a lot for firming up his stool, but he seems to be pooping less frequently each day and his weight loss seems to have slowed a bit.

I know the pred will cause increased urination, but  he started peeing outside the box a while ago, but he poops in the box! I'm sure it's a behavioral thing because of the bad feelings associated with the diarrhea.

I have two other cats and three litter boxes. I was using Blue walnut litter, then I switched to Cat Attract a few weeks ago and it didn't help. 

Any ideas? I'm cleaning pee up from the floor multiple times each day!

 

[hexiesfriend]

does he pee around the litter box? Also does he poop on the front corner? What is probably going on is His legs may be too weak to get in all the way to the other side of the litter box before going. I'd try to find the lowest litter box you can find and put pads around the box to catch any pee that goes outside the box. If that doesn't work you can you can just go buy xl incontinence pads from cvs or walgreens and lay it down close to the litter box and just let him pee on that. He will somehow know to go there and the healthy cats will still use the litter box normally. He will probably need the biggest pads ther are. Since your is ill you may want to do this for the time being and not bother with experimenting with litter boxes.

 

[karenmf]

He DOES poop close to the edge and sometimes he even just misses the box - that makes perfect sense! His hind quarters are where he seems to have lost the most muscle mass. However, he is peeing no where near the litter box. I have been using pee pads, but all of a sudden he won't use those either.  I did just see a box with a low front that I was going to try for other reasons - I have switched to disposable boxes because of the mess the diarrhea makes and I just found one with a low front, but higher sides.  

Thank you for your thoughts!

 

[hexiesfriend]

He may smell something he doesn't like on the doggy wee wee pads they do treat them with something. you may want to try human incontinence pads to see if they work. I tried all the litter boxes with mine. I actually ended up buying small plastic infant swimming pool, cut out the front, and filled it with cat litter it worked for mine for awhile. She would just walk in. I had to put it in the garage and eventually my cat couldn't make it that far and we had to do the pads.

 

[karenmf]

Thanks - I will try the human pads, too!