Forget the old saw that the way to calculate a cat’s age in human ears is to multiply each year by seven. That simply won’t give you an accurate assessment of where your cat is at in life, say the American Animal Hospital Association and the American Association of Feline Practitioners (AAFP).
According to guidelines issued jointly by the two organizations, when a cat hits the age of one, she is the equivalent of a 15-year-old person. When she celebrates her second birthday, she is more or less at the same point in her life span as someone who is 24. After that, each year of a cat’s life is the equivalent of four years of a human life. Thus, when she’s 10, it’s like being a person who is 56.
The chart breaks it down year by year and also shows a cat’s stage of life depending on her age. Stages are just as important as years. A “senior” cat should have two wellness visits a year; a “geriatric” cat, three, says the AAFP.
