undiagnosed_swollen paw

[Rae-Edzo]

My 7y/o cat, Rae was diagnosed several years ago with colitis and having allergies to food additives. Dr. McCutcheon in Toronto saved my cat by giving him immune-boosting naturopatic treatments and changing his diet to organic home food. Up until 2 years ago, for about 4 years, Rae also took ovaban pills (10mg once monthly) to help with his skin rashes.
To Rae's home-food diet, I would add Dr. Goodpet vitamine products, enzymes and acidophilus. Because Dr. Goodpet vitamine products are not available in Canada anymore, in March, 2004 the local vet where I now live suggested Rae should go back on a vet-prepared diet. Unfortunately within 2 months Rae develop numerous allergic reactions (i.e. his body became covered with itchy sores). What concerns me most is that the left paw swelled, making it difficult for Rae to weight-bear, he would also shake that paw continuously, he appeared in some pain but not too much. The local vet anesthetised Rae to do an x-ray and assessed his paw for infection. A conclusive diagnosis was impossible, the vet didn't know why the paw was swollen so he gave Rae a costisone injection and kertophen pills (anti-inflamatory drug) for 7 days. The swelling dissapeared and Rae continued eating the vet-prepared food, he continued however to shake that paw very often...I knew it wasn't completely healed. Again one month later, on June 14th, 2004 Rae's paw is very swollen and this as much as before. I have stopped the vet-prepared diet and placed Rae back on his home-food diet, hoping this will heal all his sores and the swollen paw.
I wondered, should I be more concerned about he swelling in his paw, and is there something I can do, is this an immune-response?
Also, I wondered, do I really need to add a vitaminic supplement to a home-food diet, given that I cannot find Dr. Goodpet products in Canada anymore (I tried another vitaminic product for felines that I found at our local health food store, but my other cat had 2 vicious allergic reactions to that product).
Thanks you for considering my request.

[Lucky Rescue]

This is so very frustrating! I had a cat who eventually had to be euthanized because of his allergies. I knew nothing of holistic food, etc in those days, unfortunately.

Prednisone has very dire effects, and I'm wondering if that has anything to do with your cat's painful paw. If he's shaking it that way, it's painful indeed. Ovaban can also have severe side effects, like diabetes, but probably has nothing to do with the paw.

There are two things that I think may have helped my cat if I had found out about them in time. One was acupuncture, and the other was Interferon.

You might want to ask your vet about the Interferon. It's cheap, easy to administer and just may help your cat.

Interferon & Cats

[glasslass]

I did a search for "Dr. Goodpet vitamins" through www.google.com
There are lots of sites where you can order on-line.