Before anyone says it, of course I already took her to the vet as soon as I noticed something was wrong.
A few days ago, one of our cats started acting pretty lethargic, stopped eating and drinking, and look like she’s having an all around bad time of it. Threw up a load of green bile. Diarrhea last night.
Took her to the vet, and $400 later, after running every test known to veterinary science, the diagnosis was… Vet stumped.
Except for the no eating or drinking, lethargy and aforementioned green bile throwup and diarrhea, she’s apparently the picture of health
Vet gave her subcutaneous fluids and a prescription diet (which she’s so far turned her nose up at) and said call if it doesn’t get better.
Not sure why i’m posting this. We’ve had her for 13 years. Poor kitty.
What kind of testing was done? Blood test, u/a, radiographs, ultrasound, etc? Depending on where you are, there’s usually a specialty / referral hospital or university nearby who has advanced diagnostics if you have the means to pursue additional testing (meaning money … it’s not cheap!).
Hillbilly trick to get a cat to eat (tho not sure that’s the best goal here): Let her lick karo syrup off your fingers and then put her near bland food.
It works to get half-dead kittens going, but who knows?
One reason I love my vet is that “stumped” is not a diagnosis, but rather a reason for more intense investigation via referral to a specialist, etc. (if economics permit, of course)
My cat is the same age, every once a while she will get sick as yours did but seems to recover in less than a week. This has happened a couple of times now. I was watching her pretty close but didn’t take her to the vet. I am always worried about her eating a poisened mouse or licking up antifreeze. In your case anitfreeze would be my first suspect as you would need to act on it quickly or possibly now just wait it out.
I believe cats are more sensitive to small amounts of antifreeze than are dogs and can have somewhat prolonged affects resulting in kidney failure and death. One of my cats licked up my rooting hormone residue in the greenhouse and it ended up killing her from kidney failure almost a month later. I saw her lick it but didn’t think too much about it till two weeks later when she started showing symptoms.
My first thought would be bowel obstruction or even a torsion of the bowel. When my 17-year-old cat had similar symptoms and my old vet threw up his hands, my new vet (who also did not consider giving up to be an option) suggested massive doses of hairball preventer like Petromalt. Since the cat would not eat, we put a 1 to 1.5-inch strip on a finger and scraped it against the back of her top teeth so it stuck to the roof of her mouth. This resulted in a very pissed off kitty who had to swallow the Petromalt to get it off the roof of her mouth. After a day of multiple applications of Petromalt we added in wet food administered in the same fashion, and ultimately that resulted in a considerable release of stool and consolidated hair and 5 more years with a much happier—though more suspicious—cat.
Now understand, IANAV and our cat was at the point where we had to choose either this drastic procedure or death. You might want to find out if that $400 included any examination specifically for bowel issues.
I think you mistook me. Yes, cats can be very sensitive to toxins. In particular, the fatal dose of antifreeze is less than a teaspoon. I don’t know what was in whatever your cat consumed, but a cat that has consumed ethylene glycol, in other words, antifreeze, will normally be dead within 48 hours unless prompt, aggressive medical intervention occurs. This cat is still alive after “a few days”, ergo, it isn’t antifreeze posioning.
Well, kitty deteriorated over the weekend, wouldn’t eat or drink. We kept her hydrated with a syringe and took her back in first thing this morning.
Vet repeated bloodwork, and subcu fluids and did an Xray. Bloodwork completely normal, no evidence of poisoning. Thankfully, liver functions still normal in spite of the weekend fasting. Nothing on Xray.
Did a barium swallow. Completely normal, no evidence of bowel obstruction.
But kitty still won’t eat or drink on her own.
Vet has a couple more things to test today. If those don’t pan out, its specialist time.
I’m not sure whether I should say “Good!” or “Oh damn.” It’s never easy to not know what you’re dealing with.
The only other suggestion I have (and I’m not familiar with this disease in cats so I could be completely out of line) is Addison’s disease. I’ve seen it in a couple of dogs and the symptoms include refusal to eat or drink, often without any other signs. I know vets don’t routinely run the proper test for it in dogs because it isn’t very common—and it’s considered rare in cats—but it might be worth asking your vet if it’s a possibility.
Well, we have a diagnosis: Inflammatory Bowel Disease.
Specialist took new images, saw that colon was about 5 times normal thickness (it looked huge), but no masses.
Cat now on prescription diet (which she hates) and steroids (which from reading, I hope won’t make her hair fall out).
She’s doing a bit better. Still won’t take water unless you force her, but actually ate a little on her own (her old food which she snuck from the other cats).
How do you force a cat to drink?
A syringe full of water?
Maybe some extra water mixed into the food would get more into her.
But I’m sure once the steroids do their job she’ll start feeling like her old self.
I remember reading catnip helps an appetite. Don’t know if it’s really true or not, or if you want a sick cat getting high.
