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I really need help my cat is almost two years old ever since he was 6 months we started having problems. His bottom lip was swollen really big. Took him to the vet we diagnosed him with an erodent ulcer.
We gave him serveral rounds of steroids which helped till i took him off. So we did the surgery where they scrape the ulcer out of the mouth.
And still his lips stayed big. He said it must be a food allergy so I tried many different kinds of natural foods for a month on each, didn't help.
After the steroids and surgery he started scratching his neck, so bad i had to keep it covered cause if not he would make himself bleed bad.
So we put him on some ATOPICA for dogs that regect there own skin. This is working, but i forgot to give him one pill and it through him off he started to get that thing on his neck again. So I have him back on it and we are cuting down the pills but his lip is still swollen and he has been on this medicine since october of 07.
Please help do you have any suggestions.
I do have white carpet and I bleach it with my steam cleaner once a month but my other two cats are fine and i never see him walk on it after i do this. So
Cats can become allergic to flea saliva, not to the fleas themselves. I would worry more about the carpet cleaning and bleach than I would fleas, unless I see fleas scampering around in the cat's fur.
At our cat shelter, a very dilute bleach solution was used for washing the floor, and even then, some cats reacted badly to it. The shelter now uses a biodegradable cleaner that's safe for cats.
Not to debate Wonder (cause you know I love ya ), but I have never seen a flea on my kitties...never, wait........the day I picked her up from behind a shop...she did have them....since then, none. But this solution seems to work.....and it is much cheaper than spending loads at the vet without results. Worth a try.
toplady: Tell us what you find out.....thanks and good luck
You need a definite answer to the issues & whether they are related,testing tho expensive, in the long run would be best is my guess, coz it seems to me by your post your vet is doing just that guessing & assumptions are the mother of all ballz ups..lol.. since cats are carnivorous is there any reason not to make a change to raw meats (a cheap source of raw fish is from your local fish shop & the offcuts that don't get used ),don't know why vet said no chicken i feed my cats raw chicken necks all the time bones n all (please don't say the word fish outloud but spell it out or my two eldest cats will hear you they both know what that word means..lol..).
Yeah rpg219 has a point about fleas as i've had a similar issue tho my preference is advantage,just as a side note "Virbac's Indorex Spray" is great for treating carpets,bedding & the house in general to control fleas & larvae etc it works great & lasts a year or so,if you've got a lot of carpet it's a good investment $17.95 nz 500ml spray bottle & no i don't work for em
TOPLADYJ- IF I was you I would not have taken all this talking about and took the poor cat to the VET< THATS WERE IT NEEDS TO GO < IT SHOULD HAVE ALREADY GONE TO THE VET I HOPE IT LIVES LONG ENMOUGH TO GO TO THE VET> F .B.E. SORRY IM A ANIMAL LOVER AND I HATE TO SEE ANY ANMINAL MISTREATED>
Sorry FBE...you are out of line on this one. Toplady has already stated that she has been working with the vet for about a year and a half, with prescriptions.....of which none are helping. I don't for one second believe/agree that this woman is mistreating this cat. Why else would she be seeking help?? How about we do as this site was created to do....and make some suggestions to help her.
P.S. Toplady.....for fleas in the carpet (if you have any), I found a real cheap and easy way to solve this (DIY Network showed this). Vacuum weekly and in between Vacuuming sprinkle the carpet with table salt.....yes, table salt, lol.
Salt absorbs water that in turn dissolves the salt which will make the carpet damp, if you live in a high humidity area it will cause the carpet to rot,unless you use a dehumidifier,there's always a catch ain't there..lol..
Yes, flea allergies are a possibility--in fact you generally see fewer fleas on a flea-allergic animal because they work so hard to keep them off.
Steroids do have side effects, which are generally worse when given long-term.
I do have to disagree about Hills prescription foods, however. (It doesn't have to be Hill's, Purina makes some prescription diets, as do some other companies.) I don't have a problem with grocery store brands if the animal is otherwise normal. The prescription diets are formulated with specific medical problems in mind. If there is a food allergy, the food must contain a novel protein and carbohydrate source, in other words, something the animal has never been exposed to before.
I learned the hard way about carefully reading labels--a friend had a dog with food allergies, so she was going to try lamb & rice. (This used to be a good idea, but lots of commercial pet foods now contain those, so they are no longer "novel" to many animals) Anyhow, I was going to pick up some lamb & rice Mighty Dog, and guess what was the first ingredient on the label?.....CHICKEN!...which this dog definitely had an allergy to! Started looking on other "lamb & rice" foods, and found the same problem--additional proteins than just lamb, and diffenrent carbohydrates than just rice.
You could make a homemade diet, but you have to be careful to see that it is balanced and takes into account the special needs of cats, such as taurine.
Now the question as to whether the cat food is more expensive or the allergy testing....? The testing might tell you more quickly what the problem is, allowing you to possibly find a grocery store brand that does not contain the offender(s). Or you may find out that nothing is suitable except the prescription diet...
And the problem of keeping the cats out of each other's food! I don't even have a suggestion for that one!
Thought of another couple of possibilities to discuss with your vet (he may have already ruled these out):
Autoimmune diseases such as lupus, or Feline Eosinophilic Granuloma Complex.
Rpg219 7 Topladyj - I do aplogize, when I answered this post about the caty ,there was no more then her post saying about her cat, so I took everything wrong, even befor I got to your post rpg219 reading all the posts on here i realized that I had put my big foot in my mouth, and I was going to post to her a apolagy. I was one of the ones that lost a inside cat from the tainted food, and Walmart still has not bought the rest of the food i had got that night, that night I had spent a little over 32.00 SORRY I hope you find a cure for your cat and she gets better and know has caused it for sure ; GOOD LUCK & GOD BLESS :::F.B.E.
since cats are carnivorous is there any reason not to make a change to raw meats (a cheap source of raw fish is from your local fish shop & the offcuts that don't get used ),don't know why vet said no chicken i feed my cats raw chicken necks all the time bones n all
Do not give a diet of just fish, and especially not if there's any possibility of a food allergy. (It could be as simple as the bleach, but you don't know right now.) Seafood is one thing you want to take away if you're checking for food allergies. And I wouldn't fed raw seafood anyway. You can feed a raw diet, but I don't go around suggesting it, because you better know what you're doing. So don't get into it unless you've researched it and plan to be dedicated to it. (Or buy frozen commercial raw, which can get expensive.)
The vet may have suggested removing chicken for the same reason I said: sometimes cats (and people) can develop allergies to something they get all the time. And chicken is a very common cat food flavor. So if checking for allergies, it doesn't hurt to dump the chicken too. Just because one cat is fine with it, doesn't mean another cat is.
The neck bones are fine, and that will clean teeth, whereas (contrary to popular belief) dry food won't. Raw is also fine, because the splintering comes when you cook it.
), but I have never seen a flea on my kitties...never, wait........the day I picked her up from behind a shop...she did have them....since then, none. But this solution seems to work.....and it is much cheaper than spending loads at the vet without results. Worth a try.
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