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Give dry food.
Don't give dry food.
Give both wet and dry food.
Do a raw diet.
Don't do a raw diet.
Declaw.
Don't declaw.
Even my vet. When I told him what Jinx has been eating he recommended changing her over to dry Eukanuba or Iams. I read the ingredients on the can. I may not be able to afford the really high end Blue, but at least it's better than that stuff! I get that vets don't have to take animal nutrician classes except as it relates to addressing an issue, but you'd think they would at least read some journal articles on the subject and educate themselves. I like things that are cut and dry, and expect professionals to know what they're talking about.
I'm following vets orders for the moment regarding treatment for the spot in her eye, but it's been a week and the spot hasn't shrunk at all. Sometimes I think it looks clearer, but I can't be positive. I can imagine that having ointment squirted in your eye can't feel good.
The conjunctivitis cleared up with the eye drops, but now I'm wondering if it's coming back because it looks like she has eye boogers all the time, and the lids around her eyes seem pinker than what seems normal.
Does the vet sell Eukanuba in the office? Heck, my current vet has never even asked what the food is, in about 3 years at least or more that we've been seeing him. He also doesn't sell food. Coincidence? Now not all of them are out to make tons of money off food even if they do sell it. But sometimes.... It also might be that my cat was 13 years old (at least 12, I think) when we started going there, so maybe he figures by that point what she's eating doesn't matter much. But we don't get into that at all.
What to actually feed, I mean, I've read a lot, and I try to keep learning more. It's best if you come to decisions yourself based on your own research, rather than just taking anything I or others post here as a good info. Maybe if several people post you can consider that a data point in research, but I'm still not sure I'd take that alone. For what it's worth, if I were in an ideal situation, I would feed only canned (non-fish! and with any luck without non-meat ingredients at all, or very little) or raw food with exception for dry or freeze-dried treats. Even better would be something homemade, either homemade raw or even homemade gently cooked, with meat sourced from a local or other good known source rather than mass factory butchering. Raw is definitely the way a cat would eat food naturally.
So that's ideal as I see it. But I am not in an ideal situation with Amber. She's been around nearly 16 years, and most of my good food knowledge is new. Although each change of food type/brand increased in quality, she ate only dry kibble until about 2-3 years ago. And now she eats some of both, because it's pretty damn difficult to get a cat who's been eating kibble for 13-14 years to stop wanting it. At this point I feed her one meal at night that's about 1/4 cup made of up a couple of the best kibbles I've found (Wysong Epigen and Epigen 90, and Nature's Logic). Then in the morning I feed her canned food and hope she'll eat most of it. It's been getting better recently. I keep trying new things, trying to get her off fish which is generally more interesting to her than chicken or other land animals. I found a can recently made of pheasant, that sorta kinda appears to go over a little better. I found a bottle of a food topper made by Halo that I use a bit, and I crush a piece of her favorite treat over it. And while the wet food is out there is no dry food out, even if she didn't finish the portion from the night before. I haven't pushed her towards eating a meal in half an hour or such. Sometimes she happily nibbles at the wet food even 12 hours later....
Perhaps someday when I have other cats, I will get closer to the ideal.
I would never declaw a cat. It's fairly easy to adopt an already-declawed cat if one must have a declawed cat. It was tough at times when Amber was young, but it was worth it IMO.
From stuff people have told me on here, and things I've read on my own, I think she has Uveitis caused by feline herpes. This, sort of, coincides with what the vet told me. I think he was trying to dumb it down for me because he said he thought it was caused by the herpes virus, but didn't give me a specific diagnosis. The topical anti inflammatory seems to be the accepted treatment for this too, although others have told me that you shouldn't give steroids to cats with herpes. He also gave her a vaccination that he said would help, but I can't find any information for a vaccine that would make herpes go dormant. I did find there is a vaccine for herpes, but my receipt said, "DCRC Vaccination" not "FHV-1".
Last edited by Tricia819; 03-22-2012 at 11:34 AM..
DCRC is distemper, chlamidia, rhinotracheitis, calicivirus, (rhinotracheitis is feline herpes, also called feline viral rhinopneumonitis or FVH-1)
im not sure if they make a single Rhinotracheitis vaccine which would explain why they gave her a 4-way as a herpes vaccine...but make sure to keep track of that because its also the exact same vaccine given as a "routein vaccination" (so if your doing future vaccinations you want to wait 3 years from the date of this vaccine rather than her last dedicated vaccine visit)
i dont know if itll immediatly help but it should help the body fight off any futire attacks by the virus if shes prone.
Otherwise...i generally figure it as "vets are humans" they only know what theyve been taught...and being I have acess to the world wide web its my job to do my own research too so im not just following blindly. id LOVE to say i have a vet i can trust 110% and never question ect...but the fact is humans are not perfect and even the best most up to date forward thinking vet (or doctor or teacher ect) is not going to be able to know everything.
in terms of feeding unless the vet ha a dedicated nutrtional certification (from an indepentand course not just one taught in vet school) then i assume the vet knows little to nothing about actual nutritional needs.
I like to follow the "stick to nature" when it comes to diet...right now im not practicing what i preech due to funds but i do feed the best qaulity i can afford right now, i avoid corn andsoylike the plauge ect...
just gotta use your own common sense.
and i to hate it when any professional talkes to me like ive not a clue, i dont expect them to give me the technicals...but i want actual information instead of a pat on the head and in a round about way told to let the big boys handle it.
Hope you get to the bottom of your kitties issues.
So, I started her on the lysine today and she's had the vaccine to treat the herpes. I'm probably going to have to restart the Clavamox because I think the secondary infection is coming back, but neither of these address the uveitis. Anti-inflammatories seem to be standard treatment for it, but if she can't have steroids, do NSAIDS work on it?
Most would agree
don't declaw-keep kitty inside
feed wet only
feed raw if you have the time and space
medicine both animal and human is never black or white- cut and dry -in fact little in life is.
a lot of professionals don't know what they are talking about but still stay in business.
I know dry is easier and I used cheap dry kibble for many years but became convinced high quality wet is the best way to go.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tricia819
So, I started her on the lysine today and she's had the vaccine to treat the herpes. I'm probably going to have to restart the Clavamox because I think the secondary infection is coming back, but neither of these address the uveitis. Anti-inflammatories seem to be standard treatment for it, but if she can't have steroids, do NSAIDS work on it?
There is no vaccine to treat herpes. There is a vaccine to prevent herpes, it is part of the "distemper" vaccine as already mentioned above. Even though she already has herpes, there are other things in the vaccine she needed, so it is not a bad thing that she had it, but she really won't ever need another, she's an indoor cat, right?
L-lysine will help control herpes flare-ups. 500 mg a day, for life. She may still have some flare ups that go into secondary bacterial infection, at first, and occasionally need antibiotics for that.
Eventually, on the l-lysine, the flare ups will lessen in frequency and severity, and usually they won't even go into secondary bacterial infection any more.
As for declawing, it's not something you were seriously considering was it? Declawing is illegal in 27 countries (at least) around the world, and 8 cities in California, because it is considered cruel and inhumane. Declawing is not "removal of the claws" It is amputation of the third toe digit, including bone, tendons, ligaments, nerves and claws. Cats are, quite literally, crippled from decalwing. Since they walk on their toes, they ahve to change their gait to adapt to the amputations. They can never ever stretch their back muscles properly (they need their front claws for that) and early arthritis is common.
Canned diet! Cats are obligate carnivores and not only do they need their food to come from real meat, they need their moisture to come from their food.
Keep her inside. Outside is sick people who like to torture cats, cars, predators, and disease. If you have a nice yard, you can harness train her and bring her outside, but only with you, never tie a cat out.
I'm not sure about the food thing either. Before I started reading/posting on this forum I had never heard to give them a raw diet or mainly wet food. I personally never thought there was a problem with dry food. Now I might reconsider that though. As for the declawing, DEFINATE NO! My oldest cat got declawed when I first got her, against my wished because my parents didn't want her scratching the furniture. My husband wanted to get our kittens declawed which I was against and I googled it to see what's involved. I never knew before that they actually amputate a part of their toe. I would never put an animal through that. There's so many alternatives. Kitty claw caps, sprays, tapes, etc.
So, I started her on the lysine today and she's had the vaccine to treat the herpes. I'm probably going to have to restart the Clavamox because I think the secondary infection is coming back, but neither of these address the uveitis. Anti-inflammatories seem to be standard treatment for it, but if she can't have steroids, do NSAIDS work on it?
There are no safe NSAIDS for cats.
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At this point I feed her one meal at night that's about 1/4 cup made of up a couple of the best kibbles I've found (Wysong Epigen and Epigen 90, and Nature's Logic). Then in the morning I feed her canned food and hope she'll eat most of it. It's been getting better recently. I keep trying new things, trying to get her off fish which is generally more interesting to her than chicken or other land animals. I found a can recently made of pheasant, that sorta kinda appears to go over a little better. I found a bottle of a food topper made by Halo that I use a bit, and I crush a piece of her favorite treat over it. And while the wet food is out there is no dry food out, even if she didn't finish the portion from the night before. I haven't pushed her towards eating a meal in half an hour or such. Sometimes she happily nibbles at the wet food even 12 hours later....
