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  #1  
Old July 23rd, 2008, 08:14 PM
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kilotes kilotes is offline
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cat throwing up, meds not helping, Vet not sure what is causing it.

We have a female just under a year and a male 2 yrs old. Elle our female has been throwing up for a couple months. We attempted switching foods, but there was no improvement. Rather suddenly she began throwing up more frequently (from 1 time a week to every day to 4 times a day!). She started throwing up within minutes of eating. We took her to the vet, switched to wet and the vet gave her a shot to slow down the digestion inorder to help her keep food down. She continued to throw up right away after eating. We immediately took her back to the vet, they did an X-ray and an ultra sound but couldn't find anything blocking. They kept her overnight and started giving her medication. We took her home and completed the serious of medications (now a week later), however, she is hardly eating at all and continues to throw up anything that she does eat. She has lost a significant amount of weight and we are scared. We have an appointment tomorrow morning to take her back to the vet, but we are beginning to think they don't know what is wrong. Any suggestions at all? we are trying to do everything but are really afraid we will lose her if we can't figure out what is wrong. She still behaves the same, is playing and otherwise seems healthy.

We would appreciate any suggestions or advice or questions that we could ask our Vet to help him along.

Sincere Thanks,
Melody
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Old July 23rd, 2008, 08:39 PM
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MOOSEDRY MOOSEDRY is offline
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here's hoping this helps...

hi there kilotes.

i read your post, and i think i can help.

i'm wondering if maybe elle is eating too fast because of competition with the male cat for her food (meaning maybe she's eating fast because she thinks if she doesn't, the male cat will finish first and then come over after hers), which is causing the throwing up. my best friend is experiencing exactly that problem right now. she has two males from the same litter who eat like savages (whichever one finishes first runs over to the other's bowl to try to steal some), then throws up because he ate too fast. the problem is that their stomachs can't possibly process that much food at once, so the food is rejected.

anyway, whatever the reason, i think you need to get elle to slow down with the eating. here are my suggestions: separate the two cats while they eat (not just across the room from each other - i mean put elle by herself in a room and close the door). also, give her little bits at a time, rather than her whole portion at once, waiting at least 10 minutes in between (longer if possible). also, take her soft food and mash it with a fork along the bottom and up the sides of her dish (like lining a pie plate with the bottom crust). these things combined will slow down her eating and allow her stomach to digest better. my 79 year old mother had stomach flu not too long ago and couldn't keep anything down. i called her doctor, and he said to give her little bits of food at a time, as even the most nauseated stomach in the world could keep down food in small amounts. it did the trick!!

let me know how you do. i'll be interested to hear how you make out. this worked for my friend's cats - no more puking!!

tracy (mama), jimmy (daddy), patsy , cline , punkin
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Old July 23rd, 2008, 08:51 PM
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MOOSEDRY MOOSEDRY is offline
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my other suggestion

you may also want to ask your vet about a course of prednisolone (not to be confused with prednisone). i have a pukey cat that needs that every now and then due to a sensitive stomach condition that flares up once in a while. it works for her, that's for sure. she's eleven, and gets this condition every few years.

please update us as to elle's progress when you can.

tracy
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Old July 24th, 2008, 11:50 AM
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Bump!!!!!

hi there. still hoping someone other than myself will post with some ideas for you. any news?

tracy
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Old July 24th, 2008, 12:05 PM
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I had that problem as well, my Fagan is a regurgitator... eats too fast and then throws it all up right after. Try what Moosedry suggested. But with the weight loss, make sure your vet is in the loop too. You may need to supplement something while you get them into a new eating routine (apart from each other).

Good luck!
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  #6  
Old July 24th, 2008, 03:34 PM
Jim Hall Jim Hall is offline
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well if the vet is stumped, maybe he can refer to someone else or you can find another vet ?
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Old July 24th, 2008, 05:03 PM
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That's what I was going to say, Jim..

I would look for a second opinion. If you can find a cat only vet, all the better!

Good luck!
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Old July 24th, 2008, 09:16 PM
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oops - one other question

hi there.

you said that elle seems normal otherwise. i forgot to ask: is she also still pooing and peeing with no problems?

might you be able to stay in the closed off room with her while she eats? it might help to relax her if she doesn't feel as isolated.... i'm sure you being there, talking to her in soothing tones would make her feel great!
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Old July 25th, 2008, 07:19 AM
DougG DougG is offline
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Have you had a blood panel & urinalysis done?

When my Silky developed a urinary infection in April, the first thing that clued me in was that she vomited a few times a day (usually not long after eating), her appetite went way, way down, and she started losing weight quickly. When I brought her in we had a blood panel & urinalysis performed, which revealed a urinary tract infection + struvite crystals.

It took quite a while to get rid of the infection, but now she's absolutely fine - she hasn't vomited since April, and she's put all her weight back on (and then some!!!).

Just a thought.

Keep us posted!
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Old July 25th, 2008, 07:27 AM
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yup

good suggestion, doug.

a while ago, my cline kitty had a bladder infection (unbeknownst to me), and started throwing up as a result. since she's not my "pukey" cat (patsy is), a trip to the vet was necessary. the antibiotics did the trick.

kilotes says the cat is on meds, but doesn't say what the meds are. also, she didn't state if bloodwork had been done. it's certainly worth doing if not!

hope we'll hear from this one again. i'll be interested to hear the outcome.

tracy
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Old July 30th, 2008, 04:18 AM
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kilotes kilotes is offline
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Question Update and more Q's

We took her back to the vet and they did a complete blood work up. They thought it might be FIP initially, but thankfully the blood work came back completely clean (good and bad news - still no cause). She had a fever the last visit so they have put her on a general antibiotic. Turns out she had a fever at the clinic that they did the x-ray and ultra sound also, but they didn't think much of it b/c is was low. They never even took her temperature at our Vet office when we initially took her in. Maybe it was an infection all along?

We had switched to wet food after our first Vet visit, which we thought should have helped if she was eating too fast (we read that the dry food can expand in a cat's stomach if they eat too fast). But that didn't really help.

We've had a heck of a time getting her to eat food, but found that she would eat tuna. Our Vet suggested a seafood flavored wet food instead of the meat. My husband was so excited she started eating that he gave her the entire can. We took your advice (thanks so much!) and are now only giving her around 3 ounces 2x a day. She is keeping it down for 2 days now... no vomiting/regurgitating! Our male won't even touch the wet so definately no worries about competition, if that could have been an issue. However he is actually quite a gentleman and won't eat if she is even near the food dish.

She is doing better, but we still no idea what caused the sudden increase in vomiting or the intolerance to her food that she has been on for 7 months. My husband bought a few brands of wet food, one being Iams and it seems as though she is keeping the Iams down, but when given another wet food she regurgitates almost immediately. Anyway she could have developed an alergy to something in the food she was eating? How can we find out what it is that caused the alergy if that's the case? We'd like to eventually get her back on dry b/c it's better for her teeth, but we are so afraid to even think about switching food again, now that we have one she is willing to eat and is able to keep down.

We really appreciate your advice. She has kept food down for 2 days now. She is still on the antibiotic so we are waiting till that is complete. We'll keep a closer eye on her pooping to see if she is going now that she is eating. She was not pooping before, but we couldn't tell if it was because she couldn't or b/c there was nothing in her stomach as she wasn't eating and she was regurgitating the food almost immediately.

Thanks so much for the concern and suggestions! I'll keep you updated on how she is doing. btw I did one of the online vet services and the advice here was so much more helpful, thanks again!

PS, we have already taken her to two different Vets in the area. Our regular Vet is VCA and the other was refered to us by VCA b/c they had 24 hour emergency and could observe her overnight.
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Old July 30th, 2008, 07:20 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by kilotes View Post
She is keeping it down for 2 days now... no vomiting/regurgitating!
Yay! Hope it stays that way.


Quote:
Originally Posted by kilotes View Post
Anyway she could have developed an alergy to something in the food she was eating? How can we find out what it is that caused the alergy if that's the case?
Entirely possible and very common. Most food allergies develop after repeat exposure over a long period of time. The usual culprits are beef, dairy, grains (corn & wheat particularly), soy, fish, yeast and chicken. There is allergy testing available but it tends to be unreliable in cats. Save your money. If the vomiting returns, I'd suggest trying an elimination diet instead, where you feed only one novel protein source for 8 weeks or so.

Quote:
Originally Posted by kilotes View Post
We'd like to eventually get her back on dry b/c it's better for her teeth, but we are so afraid to even think about switching food again, now that we have one she is willing to eat and is able to keep down.
Keep her on the canned. It's a myth that dry food is good for teeth, and is actually more likely to cause dental problems. Wet food is just overall much better for cats, and it would be especially good if you could eventually convince your male cat to eat it as well.
http://www.littlebigcat.com/index.ph...dcleantheteeth
http://home.ivillage.com/pets/cats/0,,p8ds,00.html
http://www.catinfo.org/
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Old July 30th, 2008, 01:24 PM
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Glad to hear she is doing better.

You may want to consider a better quality canned food (Iams is not a good food, check the ingredients). Puddles would vomit quite often and when I changed foods, it stopped except for furballs (she is a himalayan so lots of fur). One day I gave her, her old food (fancy feast) and she immediately vomited it up. She now eats Wellness, grain free and Fromms 4 star for a treat.
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