Unsolved Kitten Diarrhea

[mike758]

I got two kittens about a month ago at 8 weeks old, now they’re going on 12. Ever since I adopted them, they’ve had diarrhea. On my first vet visit, they told me that diarrhea is often a symptom of rehoming and should go away. It never did, so I called back and they had me bring in a stool sample that they sent to a lab and came back negative. I switched foods and it still never went away, so I called them back and they gave a me a dewormer. That never worked, so they had me do another stool sample that came back negative and they have no answers.

They’re not sick, they’re still playful and have a good appetite, but the diarrhea is gross and sometimes has blood. I used to give them meow mix soft cores (hard) and purina chicken dinner (soft), and the foods I switched to were purina kitten chow (hard) and special kitty kitten food (soft).

 

[molly92]

"Inexplicable" kitten diarrhea is hugely common. Stool sample tests come back as false negatives all the time, but kittens who have ever been outdoors or born to mothers who had been outdoors often have a parasite like coccidia or giardia that causes diarrhea, and it flares up with changes like adoption. If the diarrhea is brown and liquidy, chances are it's giardia, which is usually treated with metronidazole (flagyl) or panacur. If it's yellowy, coccidia is more likely and that is treated with albon or ponazuril. These are just the basics, these parasites can present differently and there are also other parasites.

A big problem is that these parasites are becoming resistant to medications in some areas, so for difficult cases, the probiotic S. Boulardii is a potential solution, and it will work regardless of what the source is so you don't need to identify it to treat it. This link has information about that: My Cat Has Diarrhea - What Do I Do?

Be sure to clean with a 10 % ammonia solution, not bleach, and wash bedding in hot water to kill the parasites so you reduce the chance of them reinfecting themselves if it is a parasite. At the end of the day, most kittens' immune systems will develop over time and be able to fight off the infection as they get older, so adult cats rarely have these issues.