Cat Starving Himself After Urinary Tract Blockage

"Derek Mark Edding" wrote in message
news
Phil P. wrote:


Hi Phil and everyone,

Thanks for the pointers.

We did receive cyproheptadine when we brought our cat in for weighing
late last week. His thyroid levels were tested and they are normal.

You might want to speak to your vet about re-testing your cat's thyroid
function with the free T4 by equilibrium dialysis (fT4ED) assay (~$20).
Your cat might have an underlying disease that's falsely depressing his T4
levels. FT4ED isn't affected by other diseases because the blood sample is
dialysed before its assayed.




We have had to pill him before and he's highly resistant, to the point
of foaming at the mouth after a few days. We started out by trying to
give it to him ground up in food, but one whiff and he refuses to eat.
He's gotten very experienced at noticing doctored food. We're going to
use the piller again and hope for the best.

Good idea. But next time you pill him, put the cypro in a #3 or #4 gelcap so
your cat doesn't taste the medication. I assume he gets 1/2 of a 4 mg pill
2x a day. Half a pill fits in a #4 gelcap perfectly. If he gets a whole
pill (which I doubt), cut it in half on the line and put both halves in a #3
gelcap. If you use the gelcap, you might not have to use the pill-popper.
Just drop the pill into the back of his throat (laryngopharynx) as far as
you can and as quickly as you can.

http://www.maxshouse.com/Medicating_Your_Cat.htm



We have two veterinarians at our animal hospital, the second one started
seeing him this week. Her opinions mostly track the first one's, but
not exactly. We're waiting on the test for pancreatitis now. She
offered us to install a feeding tube in our cat today, but we are
waiting two days to see if the appetite stimulant works. He has about 1
lb left of buffer weight before forced feeding is unavoidable, according
to his new doctor.


Texas A&M GI lab offers the new feline PLI test- which is probably the most
accurate test for diagnosing pancreatitis in cats. Its more accurate than
the TLI and serum amylase and lipase levels. You might want to speak to your
vet about it. At the very least, it should rule out pancreatitis. To my
mind, a rule-out is almost as good as a rule-in.




We also have a large plastic syringe (along the lines of a turkey
baster) and have been recommended to give him some a/d food with it as
many as six times a day if he's not eating enough. I'm hoping he'll
still be willing to eat voluntarily someday, after what he (and us) are
going through!


Try heating up the a/d or even better, canned kitten food (more protein) to
about body temperature- warmed food is more aromatic and might stimulate his
appetite. Cats are attracted to food more by smell than taste. This might
also help if he has an olfactory problem.

Best of luck,

Phil

Derek Mark Edding wrote:

We have had to pill him before and he's highly resistant, to the point
of foaming at the mouth after a few days. We started out by trying to
give it to him ground up in food, but one whiff and he refuses to eat.
He's gotten very experienced at noticing doctored food. We're going to
use the piller again and hope for the best.


I know that one! We recently had big trouble with our newest cat and
pills. Our vet suggested a compounding pharmacy. It was a life-saver. We
used a liquid medicine compounded into chicken-gravy flavor, and mixed
it with a small amount of chicken-flavored wet food. Worked perfectly.

Good luck with your cat. Pancreatitus can be tough to diagnose, our
internist vet used ultrasound to be sure for our cat a few years ago. He
ended up going being put on IVD wet food, which is a food for cat with
suspected food allergies. It has one novel protein (like duck) and one
starch. It worked very well for him.

Rhonda

Hi Folks,

I've been watching my cat eat every meal lately, trying to gauge whether
it's enough to sustain him. Our veterinarians are preparing to install
a stomach tube on him to give him more food today. They say that this
is in order to protect his liver and kidneys from damage.

Yesterday as I watched him eat a small amount of dinner, i noticed that
he was rotating his head to the left as he chewed.

It occurred to me that I've seen him do this from time to time recently,
especially when he's eating dry food. It was more pronounced last
night. At one point, his head was turned far enough that it was nearly
upside down for a moment.

I thought: Toothache!

I pointed this out to my wife, and she said "That's right. I just
remembered, the doctor told me that he had a bad tooth when I first took
him in two weeks ago." The doctor did not consider it to be a serious
problem, at least compared to the weight loss.

Could the pain of an untreated toothache cause a cat to come close to
starving to death? It seems possible to me. I've had toothaches before.

So far his blood tests have not shown any high white cell counts. If he
has a localized infection in his mouth, I don't know whether it would
show up.

Does anyone have more insight into this possibility?

Thanks again everyone.

-dreq

"Derek Mark Edding" wrote in message
nk.net...
Hi Folks,

I've been watching my cat eat every meal lately, trying to gauge whether
it's enough to sustain him. Our veterinarians are preparing to install
a stomach tube on him to give him more food today. They say that this
is in order to protect his liver and kidneys from damage.

Yesterday as I watched him eat a small amount of dinner, i noticed that
he was rotating his head to the left as he chewed.

It occurred to me that I've seen him do this from time to time recently,
especially when he's eating dry food. It was more pronounced last
night. At one point, his head was turned far enough that it was nearly
upside down for a moment.

I thought: Toothache!

I pointed this out to my wife, and she said "That's right. I just
remembered, the doctor told me that he had a bad tooth when I first took
him in two weeks ago." The doctor did not consider it to be a serious
problem, at least compared to the weight loss.

Could the pain of an untreated toothache cause a cat to come close to
starving to death? It seems possible to me. I've had toothaches before.

So far his blood tests have not shown any high white cell counts. If he
has a localized infection in his mouth, I don't know whether it would
show up.

Does anyone have more insight into this possibility?

Thanks again everyone.

-dreq

It certainly does not help!! Poor baby. I hope that he gets to feeling
better soon. (I don't think that a sore tooth (or even infected- would
necessarily show up in blood work. I tell you what, Blood tests are great
but they can be wierd too and not show up things the way one would think).

"Derek Mark Edding" wrote:

Could the pain of an untreated toothache cause a cat to come close to
starving to death? It seems possible to me. I've had toothaches before.


Yes! Why hasn't your vet figured this out, especially if he pointed it out
to your wife? He should have
extracted it before your cat got into this state, Derek. If I were in your
place I might think about
going to another vet.

wrote:
I can't believe your vet was so careless as to ignore the bad tooth. Not
only can it be very painful and cause what is happening to your cat, it
can also cause issues with other organs if infection gets into the
bloodsteam. If this were my cat I would allow them to put him under, but
not to put in a feeding tube. I'd have them do a dental instead and get
the bad tooth out IMMEDIATELY. My guess is that once the pain is gone
from the tooth he'll start eating with gusto and the stomach tube will
be unnecessary.

Megan

Thanks Megan & everyone,

We discussed the matter with his second veterinarian this morning.

Apparently the distinction here is what qualifies as a bad tooth. She
explained that he has surface decay on two of the teeth on his left
side, so that the enamel has worn away and is exposing the dentin.
There is, however, no evidence of infection. She said that this would
cause some sensitivity, possibly even pain. She does not think he would
give up eating - and throw up - as a result however.

He'll be coming home this afternoon with a feeding tube installed. He's
having more blood tests to see if his organ functions are still good.

We're back in the dark on what's going on, at least until the
pancreatitis test comes back.

This is hard.

-dreq

"Derek Mark Edding" wrote


We discussed the matter with his second veterinarian this morning.

Apparently the distinction here is what qualifies as a bad tooth. She
explained that he has surface decay on two of the teeth on his left
side, so that the enamel has worn away and is exposing the dentin.
There is, however, no evidence of infection. She said that this would
cause some sensitivity, possibly even pain. She does not think he would
give up eating - and throw up - as a result however.

He'll be coming home this afternoon with a feeding tube installed. He's
having more blood tests to see if his organ functions are still good.

We're back in the dark on what's going on, at least until the
pancreatitis test comes back.

This is hard.



Poor baby, poor you. I hope for you both.

On Fri 18 Nov 2005 02:11:29p, Derek Mark Edding wrote in
rec.pets.cats.health+behav
link.net):

Thanks Megan & everyone,

We discussed the matter with his second veterinarian this
morning.

Apparently the distinction here is what qualifies as a bad
tooth. She explained that he has surface decay on two of the
teeth on his left side, so that the enamel has worn away and is
exposing the dentin. There is, however, no evidence of
infection. She said that this would cause some sensitivity,
possibly even pain. She does not think he would give up eating
- and throw up - as a result however.

He'll be coming home this afternoon with a feeding tube
installed. He's having more blood tests to see if his organ
functions are still good.

We're back in the dark on what's going on, at least until the
pancreatitis test comes back.

I'm sorry it turned out it wasn't his teeth. That would have been a
quick fix, but I'm glad he's getting a feeding tube. If he hasn't
eaten enough for a while, it's possible that his liver is already
damaged. I had a cat who developed hepatic lipidosis from not
eating, but blood tests never showed any changes until he'd had an
ultrasound that determined it was hepatic lipidosis. I'm not sure
why it works that way. From there, blood tests were needed to make
sure he was making progress. The feeding tube makes it easy, but
please be sure to take it slow. It's so tempting to quickly dump
the contents of the syringe into him, but that will surely induce
vomiting. What type of feeding tube is it? PEG (inserted directly
through the stomach wall) or does it go down the nose or into the
throat? My cat had a PEG tube, which required some upkeep and
wrapping to keep him from trying to pull it out, but he did
amazingly well with it. I hope it won't take long to get him eating
again. Let us know what the results of the test are, please?

--
Cheryl

"Derek Mark Edding" wrote in message
ink.net...

Apparently the distinction here is what qualifies as a bad tooth. She
explained that he has surface decay on two of the teeth on his left
side, so that the enamel has worn away and is exposing the dentin.
There is, however, no evidence of infection.

Dentistry isn't my strong suit, but if the enamel has eroded to the dentin
and there's no evidence of infection, sounds like it might be a stage 2
feline odontoclastic resorptive lesion (FORL) a/k/a 'neck lesion" a/k/a
"cervical neck lesion".

Is the affected tooth one of the mandibular third premolars? If you look at
this picture of a cat's mandible, the third premolar is the first tooth
after the gap (diastema) behind the lower canine tooth.

http://www.maxshouse.com/anatomy/man...edial_view.jpg

I don't know why the lower premolars are called "3rd" & "4th" premolars-
since cats don't have 1st or 2nd lower premolars or 1st upper premolars.
But the lower 3rd premolar is the tooth that's most commonly affected with
FORL- although any tooth can be affected.



She said that this would
cause some sensitivity, possibly even pain.

If the dentin is exposed- you can be assured he's in pain. Usually, its
impossible to tell the extent of the lesion without x-rays. If one tooth is
affected with FORL, its a safe bet that others will be detected with x-rays-
even if they can't be seen by visual examination. Many times hyperplastic
gum tissue (gingiva) or even pulp covers the lesion.



She does not think he would
give up eating - and throw up - as a result however.


Is she kidding? I've seen cats with FORL *hiss* at food because they
associate the pain with the food!




He'll be coming home this afternoon with a feeding tube installed.


Oh no. I have a horrible feeling that he stopped eating because it was
painful, and a PEG tube might not have been necessary. Although at this
point, a PEG tube
might be necessary to avert malnutrition and hepatic lipidosis until he's
stable enough to treat his dental problem and get him eating on his own
again.

I can't believe the vet didn't take x-rays of his teeth before doing
anything else- especially in a cat with a visual tooth problem.



He's
having more blood tests to see if his organ functions are still good.

We're back in the dark on what's going on, at least until the
pancreatitis test comes back.

This is hard.

I feel like an idiot because I didn't think to ask you if your vet checked
her teeth- I just automatically assumed she did because that's part of a
routine examination- *especially* in a cat that stopped eating for no
apparent reason. I sure won't take anything for granted again- that's for
sure. I'm almost afraid to ask if she took your cat's temperature.

Please keep me posted on the diagnosis and his progress.

Best of luck.

Phil.

Hi Derek,

I agree with Megan.

Our cat has such a bad infection, that his face and sinuses swelled --
he had all of the symptoms of a very bad cold. With being diabetic and
him decided not to eat, we had an emergency on our hands.

The vet knew he had a bad tooth but was waiting for his diabetes to be
controlled before doing something about it. By the looks of it, she did
not think it would cause his not eating. She called in a specialist
(dentist) and he removed the tooth and planed a few others to the gum
line, but said he did not see the normal infection-paths that you would
see from a tooth causing this many problems. Both vets, the internist
and the dentist, did not think they had found the bigger reason for his
problems after the dental.

(By the way, our cat also had pancreatitus, and everything was going out
of control.)

Guess what, 24 hours after the tooth was removed he was obviously
feeling better, and started eating on his own again. He recovered very
quickly after that.

Now at any sign of a tooth problem I get the cats in and have it taken
out or cleaned.

Good luck to your cat,

Rhonda

Derek Mark Edding wrote:

wrote:

I can't believe your vet was so careless as to ignore the bad tooth. Not
only can it be very painful and cause what is happening to your cat, it
can also cause issues with other organs if infection gets into the
bloodsteam. If this were my cat I would allow them to put him under, but
not to put in a feeding tube. I'd have them do a dental instead and get
the bad tooth out IMMEDIATELY. My guess is that once the pain is gone
from the tooth he'll start eating with gusto and the stomach tube will
be unnecessary.

Megan


Thanks Megan & everyone,

We discussed the matter with his second veterinarian this morning.

Apparently the distinction here is what qualifies as a bad tooth. She
explained that he has surface decay on two of the teeth on his left
side, so that the enamel has worn away and is exposing the dentin. There
is, however, no evidence of infection. She said that this would cause
some sensitivity, possibly even pain. She does not think he would give
up eating - and throw up - as a result however.

He'll be coming home this afternoon with a feeding tube installed. He's
having more blood tests to see if his organ functions are still good.

We're back in the dark on what's going on, at least until the
pancreatitis test comes back.

This is hard.

-dreq