My roommate told me yesterday that she tripped over my kitten, and may have stepped on his front paw. Indeed, he is limping - favouring his front left leg. I have fully manipulated the leg and surrounding area, pressing on it, moving the paws, massaging, pushing out the claws etc and the kitten does not react like a normal cat would when seriously hurt. He doesn’t yelp or squirm when I touch the paw he is favouring… last time I checked him he started purring and curled up to sleep afterwards. Added to this, he is still playing - he will swipe at the fur wand with both paws, extending his claws, and he chases around with the other cat. He’s eating and drinking normally, and I’ve seen him brace on the paw briefly to perform a jump from couch to couch. The only weird thing is the limp.
I have a vet appointment booked for next week to follow up on shots. I am wondering if I can take a wait-and-see approach to this until my appointment? I would imagine if something was broken, he would yelp or hiss if I touched the affected area, no? My initial impulse is to wait another day and see if it gets better.
If the kitten is still favoring the leg after 24 hours you should have him checked as soon as possible. Kittens bounce back quick to minor steppings on, but since this has been going on for a day or more it could be a fracture.
A young cat could have a greenstick fracture or a fracture of either the radius or ulna in the front leg with the other bone still intact or a fracture in one of the many bones in the foot. None of these would be an obvious fracture and the cat could even still be walking on the leg because there would still be some support in the leg, but all would be painful and could potentially get worse if the kitten continues to walk and jump with the fractured leg.
Purring is misleading, sometimes cats will purr when they are in pain, it does not always mean they are happy and content.
I say what **susan **said, call the vet and explain.
But now I have to share about my ex-roomie’s cat, who broke his leg. A few months after the cast came off, the cat was still favouring the leg. Roomie was near hysterical with concern the her kitty wasn’t all better yet.
I came in one day to find the cat, sitting casually balanced on the back of the couch (which would have taken all four paws in working order to get on). He, sure enough, had one front paw raised and a piteous expression on his face.
I looked at him steadily and said, “Wrong paw.”
Without a blink, he put the ‘injured’ paw down and raised the other one.
Thank you to everyone for weighing in. I’m going to call the vet tomorrow. That being said, the kitten is, as we speak, currently running around. He is certainly better, but perhaps not fully healed.
Since you are going to the vet anway it doesn’t matter. But I would check the leg all the way up to the shoulder, a cat often injures its shoulder when stepped on from trying to pull away. Those lightning fast reflexes you know.