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- Sep 25, 2012
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I have been to three different vets regarding this, and I am completely at a loss for what to do.
Background:
My cat is eleven years old. About two years ago he started over cleaning his self to the point that he bleeds and is going completely bald in certain areas. Most of the area's are his ears, chin, legs and belly. They have done blood and skin tests, and every three months or so do the same tests over again and they never come up with anything. The first thing they had us do was switch out his dish for a different kind. Went from plastic to ceramic.. then we changed diet multiple times. He went from the Science Diet (which is what the place we adopted him from told us to use) and he was on that for 8+ years before he started having the issue. We then changed to Natural Balance Green Pea and Duck, as it was supposedly better for him than the Science Diet... after many months on that and still having the same issue, we switched to a grain free diet. Dave's natural wet food. Still nothing changed. So we tried for over three months to switch him to a raw diet, he never took to it, no matter what we tried. He would eat raw chicken, but no bone. He hated pork and beef, and beef liver. There was no talking him into anything but chicken breast with no bones. Since we never got him to completely go raw, I don't know if that would have helped or not in the long run.
Right now we have him on a low dosage of Prednisone and an Omega3 oil that we mix into his food. He's now eating Acana as his food and he doesn't seem to enjoy it at all. His skin got a little better while on this medication but never really cleared up. He's now very itchy and has bumps all over him. Watching him clean his self on a continuous basis due to the itchyness is heart-breaking. I am just out so much money at this point and no one can figure out what's going on. I just want to give him SOME relief in some way. All this testing and poking him with needles and medication every day added with the continuous itching has got to be completely awful for the little guy.
I should also point out that the only time his skin ever clears up is when they give him a cortisone shot. Which lasts about three weeks and then we are right back to where we were. According to numerous places giving him that shot is not good for his heart and can cause more trouble than it's worth. But it does clear it up.
Now they are saying they can go in and do a biopsy on his skin but they aren't sure if it will give them any different info.. this procedure is around $400. I would be fine paying for that if they will for sure find out something, but that's a lot of money to "maybe" get some information. Very frustrating.
I guess I am just trying to find out if anyone else has any idea's or has gone through this and can suggest anything,
Thank you so much in advance.
(Sorry for the random run-on sentences, I tried to edit it to make more sense.)
Background:
My cat is eleven years old. About two years ago he started over cleaning his self to the point that he bleeds and is going completely bald in certain areas. Most of the area's are his ears, chin, legs and belly. They have done blood and skin tests, and every three months or so do the same tests over again and they never come up with anything. The first thing they had us do was switch out his dish for a different kind. Went from plastic to ceramic.. then we changed diet multiple times. He went from the Science Diet (which is what the place we adopted him from told us to use) and he was on that for 8+ years before he started having the issue. We then changed to Natural Balance Green Pea and Duck, as it was supposedly better for him than the Science Diet... after many months on that and still having the same issue, we switched to a grain free diet. Dave's natural wet food. Still nothing changed. So we tried for over three months to switch him to a raw diet, he never took to it, no matter what we tried. He would eat raw chicken, but no bone. He hated pork and beef, and beef liver. There was no talking him into anything but chicken breast with no bones. Since we never got him to completely go raw, I don't know if that would have helped or not in the long run.
Right now we have him on a low dosage of Prednisone and an Omega3 oil that we mix into his food. He's now eating Acana as his food and he doesn't seem to enjoy it at all. His skin got a little better while on this medication but never really cleared up. He's now very itchy and has bumps all over him. Watching him clean his self on a continuous basis due to the itchyness is heart-breaking. I am just out so much money at this point and no one can figure out what's going on. I just want to give him SOME relief in some way. All this testing and poking him with needles and medication every day added with the continuous itching has got to be completely awful for the little guy.
I should also point out that the only time his skin ever clears up is when they give him a cortisone shot. Which lasts about three weeks and then we are right back to where we were. According to numerous places giving him that shot is not good for his heart and can cause more trouble than it's worth. But it does clear it up.
Now they are saying they can go in and do a biopsy on his skin but they aren't sure if it will give them any different info.. this procedure is around $400. I would be fine paying for that if they will for sure find out something, but that's a lot of money to "maybe" get some information. Very frustrating.
I guess I am just trying to find out if anyone else has any idea's or has gone through this and can suggest anything,
Thank you so much in advance.
(Sorry for the random run-on sentences, I tried to edit it to make more sense.)
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