Our kitty isn't eating
Hi, everyone!
She shies away from her food dish, doesn't want any wet food, dry food or treats, and gives me insistent loud meows.
After 3 days of her not eating, we had a vet appointment yesterday. They checked her out and ran a comprehensive blood test, urine culture test, and took x-rays of her abdomen. Her teeth are OK, she isn't congested, the doctor said her abdomen feels fine when she performed an external exam. She also told us that the blood test and the urine culture test are normal and the x-rays don't show any visible abnormalities in the abdomen.
We're stumped and have no idea what to do. They gave her appetite stimulant (ear cream) but she isn't showing any increase in appetite. My husband managed to get about 1 teaspoon of diluted cat food into her with a syringe.
We don't know what can be causing her loss of appetite. We also don't know what to do. Any and all ideas and advice will be very appreciated.
Update: We took our kitty to the vet, they reexamined her, took more abdominal x-rays, and syringe-fed her a little bit of high calorie wet food. Kitty wasn't happy being syringe-fed, of course. As she appeared dehydrated, the vet suggested we leave her there in the ICU section with an IV drip to hydrate her and also to deliver antibiotic and some other medication. They still can't figure out what's causing the appetite loss but are hopeful that the ICU treatment overnight will help. This is very expensive so we're going to bring her home tomorrow, keep giving her food and water with a syringe, and hope she gets all better soon.
Posted Aug 16, 2018, 3:41 AM UTC · edited
Vet needs to try an antibiotic and pain meds. A few days of not eating is very serious for a cat and can cause fatty liver disease which lead to death. Give her a buffet of foods to choose from, and consider tube feeding. See another vet if yours won’t take this as deathly serious.
This.
When my girl was sick (lymphoma), my vet recommended Friskies. Not health food by any stretch, but crappy calories are way better than zero calories. Whatever junk they put in it is very tasty to even very picky eaters.
I also ended up using Entyce toward the end of her life, which is a prescription appetite stimulant that you squirt directly into their mouth.
Friskies wet food is what she had been eating for several months prior to this problem. She was eating Fancy Feast before that.
Sometimes the babes just get tired of a food and we have to scramble to find something different.
I know. I hope she gets better soon.
I know this is deathly serious, and I'm on the verge of crying. We paid $600 yesterday for the tests which don't show any obvious problem. The vet is supposed to call me so we can discuss what can be done.
It’s really stressful, I know. I’ve been through the ringer with my girl who passed in June. Your vet will give you the most complete information s/he can, and I’m sure you will make a good decision for your kiddo.
Thanks for your kind words! The vet had her in ICU overnight and to the end of the day today, on IV fluids to fix dehydration, and gave her medications (for acid reflux and an antibiotic, also Vitamin B12 and an anti-nausea medication). Kitty's staying at the vet's medical boarding over the weekend so they can syringe-feed her and give her the medications she needs. We'll bring her home on Monday morning. The problem is, she's still not eating, and the vet's baffled about what's going on because all the tests (blood urine, x-rays( don't show anything abnormal. The current vet treatment is over $1,000, and we can't really afford to do anything so expensive in the future, so we hope she recovers.
Aw, poor sweetie. You might ask them to train you on providing the care she needs, so she can be comforted by being home with you and also so it’s not so expensive.