CAT HEALTH & MEDICINE

Having a cat with diabetes is life-changing—for you as well as the cat. The insulin shots required to keep the disease from doing more damage can cost $100 a month—no small issue if it’s not covered by pet heath insurance. The required changes in your day-to-day habits can be daunting, too. A cat with diabetes should ideally get his insulin shots every 12 hours, with no more than a margin of an hour or two so that blood sugar remains on an even keel (too much sugar in the blood damages tissues throughout the body). If you want to go out to dinner or sleep late on the weekend, you could potentially be putting your pet in harm’s way.

There’s head bunting, a delightful behavior where a cat bumps or rubs her forehead against yours or against your hand or leg as a sign of closeness and, presumably, affection. And then there’s head pressing, in which a cat pushes her head hard against an inanimate object in a rather forceful manner. It’s the sign of potentially serious illness, and it shouldn’t be confused with a cat casually rubbing against a piece of furniture or other stationary object to leave her scent. It has a compulsive quality to it, and the cat may keep repeating the action, more or less oblivious to what’s going on around her.
What could be wrong?

It seems like common sense. A disaster occurs—a hurricane or fire or perhaps a chemical spill —and you put your cat in the car and get as far away as you can. But what if you’re going to be removed from your home for days or weeks? How much food and water should you have on hand for the cat? How many days’ worth of his prescription drugs?
The answers to these questions might seem like common sense, too, but what appears obvious to you now might get lost in the midst of a situation where there’s not a moment to lose as you’re scrambling to keep safe. That’s why the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) has updated its guidelines for how to prepare in advance for an emergency that requires evacuation from your home.

At some point your cat may be sent home from the veterinary clinic wearing an e-collar—a hard plastic cone around her head that will keep her from biting and scratching at stitches or wound dressings. It needs to be kept on for two weeks in most cases so your pet doesn’t bite or lick the incision that’s being protected. People think animals can cure themselves by licking, but that’s not really true. Bacteria from the mouth can cause an infection where the skin is healing, requiring antibiotics and, in some cases, surgery to open up the incision, flush it, and place a temporary drain.

Your cat has to swallow a pill every day for a health condition and has always taken it without a problem. But one morning, seemingly out of nowhere, he has begun refusing it.

Q: Which is better, a small veterinary office with just one or two practitioners that you develop a relationship with or a large office with veterinarians on staff who have particular areas of expertise so that you don’t have to go somewhere else should your cat get sick with a specific illness?
Mason Tobias
New York, New York

You’re petting your cat and notice that he’s drooling along with fluttering his eyelids. Or he starts drooling while kneading you. Is something wrong?

There’s no doubt that life expectancy for cats continues to rise with advances in veterinary care. In one study, how long a cat was expected to live went up by more than two months for every year from 2013 to 2019. But there are differences in a cat’s life expectancy depending on certain factors.

Most cats have eyelashes, but not the way we think of lashes. They’re more like a row of relatively thick facial hairs that are the same color and length as a cat’s body hair. Because they blend in and can be hard to see, it could easily seem as though 
they’re missing.

Your cat is wobbly on her back legs and perhaps seems to be in pain. Maybe she also has urinary and fecal incontinence; waste exits her body when she is not trying to “go.” It’s possible she has intervertebral disc disease (IVDD). It’s much less common in cats than dogs, but it does occur. A new study in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association says that advancing age and excess weight predispose cats to the condition. What is it exactly?

An occasional bout of diarrhea is no cause for alarm. If your cat’s appetite remains good and she is as active as she usually is, it’s generally safe to wait two or three days to see if the problem resolves on its own, says Tufts veterinary internist Michael Stone, DVM. Reasons for loose stools that quickly resolve on their own:
™ Your cat had a bacterial or viral infection, but her body was able to vanquish it without medical treatment.
™ Your pet was feeling stressed. Something like young children visiting your home and running around or coming home from a stressful veterinary visit could send her gastrointestinal tract into temporary overdrive.
™ 
Your cat ate more food than she’s used to.
™ She had an unusually rich treat.
When do loose stools become a concern?
The clue to whether you should take your cat to the doctor because of diarrhea is whether it’s persistent over the course of a day or a day and a half, your pet is lethargic, or she has a decreased appetite. Then it’s not just a few instances of watery stools but a situation that perhaps could lead to dehydration and potentially dangerous electrolyte imbalances. In such cases, some professional sleuthing is necessary to find out what’s causing the problem and also to get it under control.
If it’s a young cat such as a kitten, the diarrhea may be due to intestinal parasites like roundworms. An older cat’s diarrhea may be attributable to, say, hyperthyroidism or perhaps lymphoma that has spread to the GI tract. The vet may have to run some tests.
Whether or not the situation seems serious, don’t give your cat anti-diarrheal medication intended for people. Many of those medications contain ingredients that can be dangerous for felines and will only serve to make a bad situation worse.

If you notice small, hairless nodules on the head, neck, trunk, limbs, or other parts of your cat’s body, take your pet to the doctor. They may be mast cell tumors—one of the most common types of skin tumors on cats, and in some cases malignant. The good news: Even though mast cell tumors are a source of concern and can be intermittently itchy, red, and even ulcerated, they tend not to recur or spread to other sites in the body if promptly taken care of.