Kitten with unknown health problem

[Sanddi]

My Mother has a wonderful black kitten named Jack. He was a rescue. He had bloody stool. He had round worm. That cleared up. Then it was gardia. That has gone. We have a wonderful Vet he has run every test you can think of we are still waiting for results on one test . Everything comes back negative. He has been on every perscription food and still he has loose stool and he is very gassy. He is 9 months old his coat is shiny he is a solid 12 pounds , loves to play. Has anyone had a similar health issue? Can anyone suggest a good quality food? Any advice would be be appreciated.


Thank-you

Sanddi

[Jim Hall]

is he getting nay treats other than hos regular feedings and maybe a diff kind of food no grain maybe also check the water you are using i know where i am the water is very chlorinated and some cats just react bad to that

[bendyfoot]

I used to beleive in prescription foods, and all my animals were on them at one time or another for various issues...then I learned what was in them and how nutritionally inferior they were to other products.

Our little gasbag Jaida was positively RANK when she was a puppy, despite being otherwise healthy. I'd consider switching to a better food. We've got our gang on Orijen, and the gas is gone.

Others here know more about food than me, I'm sure they could offer suggestions...or check out the food forum.

[sugarcatmom]

Originally Posted by Sanddi

He has been on every perscription food and still he has loose stool and he is very gassy.

The prescription food may very well be part of the problem. They tend to have lousy ingredients (despite their high cost) that really are not appropriate for an obligate carnivore. My suggestion is to find a good quality canned food with no grains or fish (common allergens), or even better, look into a raw diet. Wellness, By Nature Organics, Nature's Variety, Innova Evo are all good canned foods. The Evo and N.V. also have novel proteins like duck and rabbit that are great if an inflammatory response has developed to the more common protein sources. I wouldn't feed any dry food whatsoever.

[NoahGrey]

I Have my cat on the Wellness brand. Very good quality food.

ACO22

[Sanddi]

Thank you all , for answering me so quickly . I will pass the info on to my Mother. She will be very happy that there are people out there that care so much for their furry family members.

Thanks again Sanddi

[Kristin7]

Perhaps his GI tract is still recovering from the worms and giardia. He may grow out of this. And I agree with the others about switching to a better quality food. If that doesn't work you could try giving your cat a little canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie mix) with meals, or perhaps some plain yogurt (as a probiotic).

[wiredogs]

Hi, I am or was a vet tech till I had kids 3 years ago and now I stay home with them. However, I have seen several of these cats. One thing that can really help is a high fiber diet. Feed a hairball food or Meow mix has an indoor formula with a lot of fiber. Some cats never seem to get totally cleared up but I would guess this will help.

[phoozles]

I'm afraid I have to disagree about using Meow Mix - your best bet is, as sugarcatmom suggested, a good quality canned food.

[krdahmer]

Everyone here has given great advice (minus the meowmix one IMO).

My Windy lived up to her name as a kitten... and has a very sensitive belly (had the runs on many foods we've tried)... what seems to work is a higher quality single source protein food (one meat only- lamb or duck is best for tummy issues and/or allergies). The one I feed is dry, but wet is best.

Welcome to you and best of luck to your mom!

[growler~GateKeeper]

Sugarcatmom has given excellent food suggestions have a look @ these food ingredients you will see the difference in quality compared to the vet food & the cr@ppy grocery store food - meowmix is a BAD food suggestion - they won't even list ingredients on their site


The suggestion for probiotics is a good one will help to replace the good flora in the poor baby's upset tummy.

I would suggest Heinz Organics or Earth Organics pureed pure Butternut Squash BabyFood over the canned pumpkin - only because cats generally like the taste better.

[Love4himies]

My Jasper used to have that problem when he was eating a poor quality, grain filled food. He now eats Wellness, grain free, canned and Orijen kibble and has made a world of difference in his digestion. If your cat does not drink a lot of water, I would suggest only canned.

[gyrfalcon]

Hi. First-time poster here.

I had exactly the same problem with my two feral rescue baby kittens (found trying to nurse on their dead mother by the side of a highway at 4 weeks old, poor things!). The vet tested and medicated for everything and they still had very soft wet stool and terrible gas. My otherwise wonderful vet was pretty clueless about cat nutrition, as so many are, and shrugged off my questions about diet. The bad stool persisted for a solid year.

So I finally started researching the problem on my own and learned that many cats are unable to digest not just some proteins but some or all grains, as well. The only thing to do is spend a lot of time in the aisles of the pet food store or on line reading labels so you can try a month's or so worth of single-protein food and then the next and then the next. I did that and they had the problem with everything. Next I started on the grains, which was harder then because almost everything had either rice or corn. Then I tried them on Pinnacle, which uses oats, and bingo, the diarrhea cleared up within a day or two. Then Innova Evo came out, which has no grain at all, and now Wellness has started having grain-free foods.

It can be a long, long tedious process of trying one kind of food after another until you can pinpoint the problem. As it turned out, my guys do just fine on anything that doesn't have corn or rice in it, but I've since become convinced that totally grain-free is the best thing for cats, so they get Evo and Wellness, with occasional treats of Eagle Pack or Pinnacle fish, which use sweet potato and oats respectively.

One other thing you can try that didn't work long-term for my cats but sometimes does and might for your mom's is a digestive herbal mixture for animals that contains an herb called Slippery Elm, which soothes the bowels from the inflammation. This also had an immediate effect on my cats that lasted for as long as I gave it to them, but the problem came right back again the first day they were off it.

But sometimes just stopping the inflammation and soothing the bowel for a few weeks will get everything back on track and it will stay that way. Since your mom's cat had a bunch of parasites and worms that could have irritated the bowel, the Slippery Elm might be worth a try.

Good luck with this. I think a lot more cats have this problem in one form or another than vets really realize, and I think it's also why so many people think litter boxes are so terrible smelling even when they're cleaned regularly.

I must say, though, that it did give me a laugh every time one of my two gorgeous boys would jump in my lap, gaze up at me with affection, purr loudly and let loose with a great big fart!

[Sanddi]

Thank-you for taking the time to share your story with me. Those poor babies. How old are they and what are their names. I have two kittens named Petee and Paddy they were both born May 9 2007 but they are not brothers. Petee came from ARK Paddy is my Mothers female cat Bella's baby. Bella was rescued just before she gave birth to four kittens. My three girls passed . Two lived to be almost 18 the other Maggie died at only ten it was very quick and very sad. The vet said it was sudden liver failure, I think it was brought on by her sister Sly's passing . All my cats have always been healthy, My golden who loves the new kittens also has no health issues . We have been very luckly . Thanks again for your time and good advice.


sanddi

[gyrfalcon]

I only have one of the two feral kittens with the digestive problems now. The other little guy, Eddie, disappeared last year one day and I'm pretty sure he was killed by one of the coyotes around here, although I'll never know for sure. He'd only been going outside (in the daytime only) for about six weeks, which was several months after we moved from the Boston suburbs to the Vermont countryside. His littermate, Marco, is just 5-and-a-half now and much more timid than bold Eddie, so I'm optimistic he may be able to stay safe.

For Marco's and my sake both, I adopted two tiny barn kittens this summer from a nearby farm family that has a whole colony of unusually healthy cats living in their barn. They're now about 7 months old, and their names are Maggie and Mr. Johnson. (Don't ask me why, that's what they insist on!) We're not really sure whether they're actually related or not, they were just two of many kittens around the same age hanging out with each other and the nursing females. I'm waiting until spring to let them start going out, when they're big enough to look after themselves a bit.

Eddie and Marco were rescued in Kentucky. They and two litter mates who did not survive the ordeal were probably there for at least two days with their dead mother's body, they think, before they were found. They barely made it. Then they were brought up to a home-based shelter near Boston by that sort of pony express of animal lovers who drive them 100 miles or so before handing them off to the next volunteer.

They went to the home of a woman who specialized in tending tiny orphan kittens, who fed them well and got them the vet treatments they needed, and put them up for adoption at 8 weeks, which is when I got them. I lived on a very busy street in the suburbs then, so they were indoor-only, but their nature called them very strongly to go out, and I promised them one day we'd move to the country and they could be outdoor boys.

There's zero doubt in my mind that if Eddie had gotten to choose, he would have chosen six short weeks of enjoying the outdoors rather than 15 more years of frustration indoors, and I console myself a bit with that.

Losing an animal friend, however it happens, is just unspeakably painful, but yet we keep bringing them into our lives anway, knowing what we're letting ourselves in for down the road, don't we.

Except for the digestion problems, now solved, Marco has always been as healthy as a horse, and the two barn kittens look to be the same. But poor lost Eddie had a whole raft of relatively minor health problems, mostly stress-related, which I hope I can help with when the subject comes up on these forums.

I would suggest you get your mother to start her cat on Wellness Chicken formula (canned), and odds are high that if the problem is dietary intolerance, that will fix her cat right up. It's grain-free, and almost all cats can eat chicken with no trouble (not so turkey, I think). If that solves the problem, she can branch out from there and try some other things and gradually figure out what ingredient is causing the trouble and will know to avoid it.

[Sanddi]

Thanks again for all of your suggestion and concern. Jack is doing much better . He is still farting like my brother, but his poo is better. My Mother is very happy with the improvement. We got the result from his last test and once again it was negative. She put him on ,I cant spell it but i can pronounce it, ebakanuba. Any thoughts on this food?
thanks Sanddi

[gyrfalcon]

Originally Posted by Sanddi

Thanks again for all of your suggestion and concern. Jack is doing much better . He is still farting like my brother, but his poo is better. My Mother is very happy with the improvement. We got the result from his last test and once again it was negative. She put him on ,I cant spell it but i can pronounce it, ebakanuba. Any thoughts on this food?
thanks Sanddi

I would not feed my cats Eukanuba. For one thing, it was one of the companies importing crummy (and nutritionally useless filler) ingredients from China that were tainted and had to be recalled because it poisoned so many animals. Its main ingredients aren't the worst out there, but they're quite poor in comparison to the better cat foods-- none of which had to recall products.

Have a look at this site by a veterinariian who has seriously studied cat nutrition. She has a long section on ingredients and how to read cat food labels. www.petinfo.org

[sugarcatmom]

I think gyrfalcon meant this site: http://www.catinfo.org/

And no, I wouldn't feed Eukanuba either. Is it dry or canned?

[Sanddi]

Its dry food. My mother bought this before I had a chance to show her this web site. Is it not a good good?

[gyrfalcon]

Originally Posted by sugarcatmom

I think gyrfalcon meant this site: http://www.catinfo.org/

And no, I wouldn't feed Eukanuba either. Is it dry or canned?

Thanks very much for the correction.

[gyrfalcon]

Originally Posted by Sanddi

Its dry food. My mother bought this before I had a chance to show her this web site. Is it not a good good?

the info on www.catinfo.org. She has convinced me to not feed my cats any grains whatsoever and never to feed dry food except for the occasional small treat.

[onster]

Maybe ask ure vet about fortiflora by Purina...my guy had very loose stool since we adopted him and ongoing for about 4 months after...we tried this and his poop firmed up, finally!!

http://puppies.bigelbach.com/HEALTH-...0-Packets.html

[Deda Brada]

Hi Sanddi!

12 pounds is pretty much for an average cat, don't you think so. Loose stool and gassy intestines maybe indicate that your mother's cat is overeaten. Is stool loose, or it is diarrhea? Stool may become loose when someone (cat or human) eats more then he can digest. One of the problems may be the lack of pancreatic enzymes (exocrine pancreatic insufficiency, but it is very rare in cats). The stool is usually greasy in that case.

If stool is diarrhea, and every other reason is excluded, than cat maybe has a disorder known as "inflammatory bowel disease". The conclusion about which part of intestines is affected can be made depending on the type of diarrhea (small bowel or colon). Of course, biopsy is the best way of making this diagnose.

Good quality food is some from "Royal Canin". I strongly believe they're the best in the world!

Many regards from Deda Brada.

[Sanddi]

He was on royal canin it didnt help. It may have been the giardia. He is not overweight he is solid. When we got him he was bigger than my kittens and he was younger and already fixed They said he was born June 23 and he was 5.5 lbs that was Sept 1. My boys were 2.5 and 3.5lbs they were born May 9. . We are not really sure how old he is. We think he is the same age as my boys that would be 10 months. He does not over eat that we have noticed. He has improved. He is happy his coat is shiny and very playful. He poo is better today . Here's hoping he continues to get better.

Sanddi

[growler~GateKeeper]

Originally Posted by Deda Brada

Good quality food is some from "Royal Canin". I strongly believe they're the best in the world!

for the minor threadjack here but Royal Canin is FAR FAR from the best food company in the world!!!!!!

My cat was poisoned from eating tainted Royal Canin cat food she has Kidney Failure as a result :sad: and the Royal Canin/Medi-Cal vets agree that this was CAUSED by their food!

Sanddi If you want a great food for your mum's cat look into Holistic grain-free, chemical-free foods such as Wellness, Eagle Pack Holistic, Nature's Variety, Innova Evo, Merricks, California Natural

[CyberKitten]

I have to agree! RC is not highly regarded - it has way too much fiber and carbs and some other ingredients (read the ingredients before you buy ANY cat food) - same goes for Meow Mix which is really just like giving your kids junk food. I used to use it before I knew better and I know we all had to learn some time.

I am not a fan of any dry food- cats do not do well with them - they are carnivores and do not need all that grains. They need MEAT and protein and some other very specific ingredients like taurine.

I am loathe to suggest my own experience if only because the scientist in me tells that what works for me may not work for your mom's kitties but after the scare with pet food - and I am not convinced things have changed that well, I consulted a veterinary nutritionist t a vet school and created my own diet specific to the needs of my 4 cats. It took them some time to adjust because you have to be very careful and cautious in changing diets- it has to be done slowly since cats have very queasy digestive systems - and mine were used to Wellness and the occasional treat of sardines and some junk food of real tuna (not the cat food kind and sea food). It is possible these kittens have a nutritional deficiency just in the same way humans say have celiac disease or some other illness but since the change in suet - even though my cats were healthy before- they are doing extremely well on the diet I now cook for them. It took awhile and (a few months) but they have the best coats of any cats I know and are extremely healthy. However, I think the diet needs to suit the cat so you might try to find a vet or a veterinary nutritionist who can help you.

But Royal Canin and Meow Mix are really awful stuff- way too much dry food that lacks any kind of good value. They also need to drink more water and you can give them foods with water in them so they get some that way.

Good luck!!!

[Sanddi]

I am so sorry for your your loss.

It's breaks my heart to hear these awful truths. I will make sure my Mother reads this . I think its time for both her and I to get wellness for our little ones.

Thank-you for sharing with me. I know how hard it is to lose the furry members of the family


Sanddi

[growler~GateKeeper]

Oh No Sandii - Duffy's still here with me Thank Dog!
She is feeling better than before with the guidance of her new homeopath vet & a switch to raw food. We're currently awaiting the latest test results Thankfully it was caught early & she'd only eaten most of one bad bag but could've been much much worse.

I just hate to see people praise that company for their food.

for your kitties. Wellness is awesome

[Deda Brada]

Hi Sanddi!

As far as I know, giardia causes diarrhea, not loose stool. Giardia is pretty hard to diagnose, but it is treatable (by metronidazole), which many vets do whenever diarrhea exists without any other known cause. I repeat, diarrhea can be caused by inflammatory disease, enteritis or colitis, too. Loose stool has something with poor digestion of food, which can be caused by lack of pancreatic digestive enzymes, or by insufficient flow of bile. At the end, maybe it's nothing serious at all, which I really hope, but better be alert.

I'm glad to hear that your boy is getting better. I am sorry, I didn't mean to insult neither him nor you when I said he was overweight. Maybe he is just big boy, long and tall.

Many regards from Deda

[Deda Brada]

I can't imagine that you could by tainted food. How old was it? Where did they keep it before it became tainted? Where did it happen, in Pakistan? Even here, at the and of the world, in the Europe's province called Serbia, you can barely find tainted cat food of any brand. How didn't you see that the food was tainted? "Royal Canin" surely didn't produce tainted food, so why to blame them?
Finally, why do I argue about "Royal Canin"? I am not their dealer, or so. Everybody will choose food according to his (her) apprehension.