CAT HEALTH & MEDICINE

[From Tufts March 2011 Issue]

For the last several years, we have been feeding a feral cat. About six months ago, we were successfully able to trap him and brought him to a veterinary clinic to be neutered and vaccinated. Unfortunately, he tested positive for feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV).

Since then, he has become much more mellow, coming when we call him and allowing us to pet him when he is eating. We created an outdoor shelter for him that includes a heated water bowl and heated cat beds. Twice a day, he is fed a quality high-protein diet, and monthly, he receives a topical flea treatment. Separated by a screen door, he interacts nicely with our three indoor cats who are all FIV-negative.

[From Tufts May 2011 Issue]

Changing a cats routine - for example by bringing in a substitute caretaker at vacation time or starting a new feeding schedule - can prompt an otherwise perfectly healthy cat to vomit, refuse to eat and eliminate outside the litter box. This was the key finding of research at Ohio State University that was recently published in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association. Healthy cats were found to be as likely to react in these ways as were chronically ill cats with feline idiopathic cystitis, whose symptoms can include inappropriate urination and frequent urination of small amounts. Idiopathic cystitis means inflammation of the urinary bladder of unknown cause.

[From Tufts June 2011 Issue]

Editors note: This is the second of a two-part series looking at managing pain in cats. The first part covered how pain is assessed and featured the Pain Clinic at Tufts University. This second part focuses on pain medications for cats with arthritis.

A ccording to the American Association of Feline Practitioners new life-stage guidelines, a 20-year-old cat is approximately equivalent to a 96-year-old person. This would make Brian and Valerie Sciarras cat, Odaat, at age 20, nearly a centenarian.

Witnessing your cat get into a crouched posture, make retching sounds and then vomit undigested food or bile - usually on a hard-to-clean surface like your carpet or your bedroom pillow - is not pleasant for you. And vomiting is certainly unpleasant for your cat.

Why do cats vomit? When should it be considered a harmless, isolated incident and when should it prompt owners to seek veterinary care?

[From Tufts January 2011 Issue]

Frustrated by cats asthma treatments
My 10-year-old cat, Cassie, was diagnosed last year with asthma. The veterinarian has never seen her have an attack, but based on my description of it, she agreed it must be asthma. An X-ray of her lungs proved inconclusive.

We first tried an inhaler (with Flovent) prescribed as needed, but over time, Cassie needed daily doses. Because I didnt want to subject her to the inhaler every day, we started giving her oral doses of prednisone suspension malt daily instead. This medication did little good and Cassie continued to have asthma attacks almost daily.

[From Tufts February 2012 Issue]

Are my cats contagious?
Itrapped two stray kittens last year and had them treated for ringworm. They were neutered and given two rounds of kitten vaccinations. They also had bad breath so my veterinarian cleaned their teeth and needed to extract some teeth. She informed me that one cats dental problems had migrated into the root.

At the College of Veterinary Medicine at Kansas State University, a new research project has proven to be promising in treating feline infectious peritonitis (FIP), a lethal feline disease that has been almost 100 percent fatal. Because of the deadliness of FIP, there have been many efforts to develop effective treatments - but none have been at all successful up until now.

Obviously, its very distressing to a cat owner if she witnesses the plight of an otherwise healthy animal having difficulty moving her bowels. The cat will crouch over her litter box and stare fixedly ahead - her abdomen contracting and her legs and hind quarters quivering as she strains to pass an impacted stool. If her efforts pay off at all, she may eventually pass a small, hard, dark-colored fecal mass into her litter box.…

First scenario: Your 14-year-old cat has a large but benign tumor in one of her toes that is causing her pain and interfering with her mobility. You decide to:(a) Schedule a surgery to excise the tumor.(b) Realize that the tumor is causing pain and limiting her freedom and will euthanize her when you have to because the risks of anesthesia that go along with the surgery are too great.(c) Wait and see.

When the outcome resulting from an expensive and difficult treatment is unclear, you will not be left entirely on your own when it comes...

The art of traditional acupuncture traces back several thousand years to ancient China, and is one branch of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). The other three branches are herbal medicine, food therapy and Tui-Na (medical massage).

The feline urinary system relies on two structural components: an upper tract and a lower tract. The upper urinary tract consists of two kidneys, which handle the biochemical processes; and two slender tubes (ureters) - one leading from each kidney - that deliver waste-containing urine from those organs down to the lower tract.

The lower urinary tract - whose function is solely excretory - consists of the bladder, a muscular sac that receives the urine delivered to it through the ureters and stores it until it is expelled from the body via the other component of the lower tract, the urethra, a narrow tube leading from the bladder to the outside world.