Hi Everyone!
Since we adopted my girl almost 2 years ago, she has had ongoing over grooming issues. At first, we thought she was just a really clean kitty and just let her clean, no big deal. After taking her to the vet a month after adopting her for her wellness exam - we found out she was NOT spayed as I was told that she was. This created a whole back and forth between myself and the shelter for their poor record keeping however I felt most comfortable using my own vet and chose to assume the cost myself for the spay surgery. Immediately after that her licking went into severe over drive to where she was making sores on her knees and legs. We tried everything from behavioral medications thinking it might be anxiety or nerve related - tried claratin regular, steroids, depo medrol stroid injection - you name it, we did it. Finally I took her to the dermo and we did a blood test which came back that she was allergic to dust mites and storage mites. The derm put her on Prednisolone for almost 2 months and also atopica. This totally helped her and all of the boo boo's healed and she was at peace. We are still on the atopcia and the licking has increased but she isn't making wounds or anything. I'm curious on many of the posts here about food allergy testing. I was under the impression that this wasn't accurate for cats - looking for more information on what type of allergy test this is ( blood, or inter dermal where the animal is sedated and they shave an area of skin and do various needle testing ). We decided to not do the inter dermal testing at this time because it takes awhile for the steroids to work themselves out of the body and because of her licking issues after her spay surgery, I'm hesitant to shave an area which would be exposed to her licking once that test was over with. Her fur is pretty thick and dense and I think that helps to keep her from making sores. We are considering also starting her on allergy shots for the dust mites/storage mites. The vet doesn't think it's food allergies that are involved as well however I have had one heck of a time getting her stools formed and solid - typically she's always had softer cow patty type stools even with trying a de wormer, flagyl, steroids. I am currently giving her s. boullardi and that has finally helped to firm and form her poops - thought I'm still searching for a good probiotic to add to this mix - tried a pet probiotic and that didn't help and I'm not a fan of the forti flora. I think some members have used acidophilus but I'm not sure how much would be acceptable. Still researching that one...
Since we adopted my girl almost 2 years ago, she has had ongoing over grooming issues. At first, we thought she was just a really clean kitty and just let her clean, no big deal. After taking her to the vet a month after adopting her for her wellness exam - we found out she was NOT spayed as I was told that she was. This created a whole back and forth between myself and the shelter for their poor record keeping however I felt most comfortable using my own vet and chose to assume the cost myself for the spay surgery. Immediately after that her licking went into severe over drive to where she was making sores on her knees and legs. We tried everything from behavioral medications thinking it might be anxiety or nerve related - tried claratin regular, steroids, depo medrol stroid injection - you name it, we did it. Finally I took her to the dermo and we did a blood test which came back that she was allergic to dust mites and storage mites. The derm put her on Prednisolone for almost 2 months and also atopica. This totally helped her and all of the boo boo's healed and she was at peace. We are still on the atopcia and the licking has increased but she isn't making wounds or anything. I'm curious on many of the posts here about food allergy testing. I was under the impression that this wasn't accurate for cats - looking for more information on what type of allergy test this is ( blood, or inter dermal where the animal is sedated and they shave an area of skin and do various needle testing ). We decided to not do the inter dermal testing at this time because it takes awhile for the steroids to work themselves out of the body and because of her licking issues after her spay surgery, I'm hesitant to shave an area which would be exposed to her licking once that test was over with. Her fur is pretty thick and dense and I think that helps to keep her from making sores. We are considering also starting her on allergy shots for the dust mites/storage mites. The vet doesn't think it's food allergies that are involved as well however I have had one heck of a time getting her stools formed and solid - typically she's always had softer cow patty type stools even with trying a de wormer, flagyl, steroids. I am currently giving her s. boullardi and that has finally helped to firm and form her poops - thought I'm still searching for a good probiotic to add to this mix - tried a pet probiotic and that didn't help and I'm not a fan of the forti flora. I think some members have used acidophilus but I'm not sure how much would be acceptable. Still researching that one...
