Eye discharge and face swelling

catloveroc

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Hi everyone- I hope you and your kitties are all well.

I am new here and I am looking for some advice and support. I have two cats who have recently been sick, and i have no one to help, so I have really struggling, especially emotionally.

I adopted a kitten from a rescue association two months ago, and it turns out he had an URI and giardia. The association didnt tell me anything, they said she was healthy and checked.

Well I brought her home and my resident cat (3yo) got sick within a few weeks. The kitten had an eye infection which resolved fast with antibiotics and eye drops. BUT the resident cat got really sick.

First his eyes started to have discharge. I brought him to the vet and they gave him eye drops. However the morning after he woke up with massive facial swelling on one side and lots of fluid discharge from the eye. I ran to emergency with him and they put him on fluids, and gave him a steroid shot and put him on a week of clavamox antibiotics. He was doing terrible. After that week, we went to the vet and they gave him another week of oral antibiotics plus oral steroids.

It seemed he was doing better but his eyes started to have discharge again after we finished the two weeks of antibiotics. Now it has been almost 4 weeks and he hasn't recovered yet. His eyes are still doing really bad, with lots of discharge. Plus he had diarrhea. The vet gave me terramycin eye ointment. But i dont see improvements.

He is the absolute joy of my life and I am in panic to see him in this state and i cannot forgive me for having brought in the new kitty. I dont know what to do, and i feel the vets are not really solving the situation. Any help and support would be appreciated. I'm a tearful mess :(
 
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catloveroc

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I should add that we did blood work at the emergency which seemed ok at the time, and we tested for FIV/FeLV and he was negative.
 

FeebysOwner

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I agree with Mamanyt1953 Mamanyt1953 about getting the discharge cultured. Even if it isn't viral, he may need a different antibiotic to knock out the infection. The diarrhea could have been from the antibiotics as they tend to mess up gut bacteria. So, if he needs more antibiotics, give him some saccharomyces boulardii while he is taking them - it is a yeast-based probiotic that promotes gastrointestinal health but doesn't interfere with the antibiotics as some other types of probiotics can. .
 

tarasgirl06

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I should add that we did blood work at the emergency which seemed ok at the time, and we tested for FIV/FeLV and he was negative.
Hello C catloveroc and family, and welcome to TCS! I am sorry to hear that your loved ones are having these problems and I also encourage you to call your vet back right away and to follow other posters' suggestions, as soon as possible. Please keep us informed! *Prayers* for your sweet cats.
 

Antonio65

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Hi and welcome to TCS C catloveroc .
I'm so sorry to read about your cat's situation.

Can I ask you if your resident cat is up-to-date with his vaccinations? Sounds like the new kitten brought some rhino or herpes virus in.
You mention the kitten tested negative to FIV and FeLV. How old is she? The usual snap tests for these diseases can, sometimes, give a false response when the cat is too young, say younger than 5 or 6 months.

Is there chance for you to take the resident cat to another vet and get a second opinion?
 
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catloveroc

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Hi All- thank you SO MUCH for all your replies and support.

Yes, the kitten brought in a bunch of diseases: the upper respiratory virus and also giardia :(
I am treating the kitten with panacur and metronidazole for the giardia- it's been a struggle, the metro is so bitter, even the compound liquid, and to hold her and give her the syringe is not easy. But I keep at it. I am also cleaning the litterbox as soon as they go to the bathroom.

My older cat is also a rescue, so we do not know the age for sure, but should be around 3yo. I got him about a year ago.

I did give him 10% fat Greek yoghurt and he loves it, i hope that helps with the gut issues. He doesn't have diarrhea anymore, he only had it for two days. I had his poop tested twice and both times it came negative for all round, whips, worms and giardia. I will have him retested again in a few weeks.

I have called the vet again about his eyes and they said to stay the course with the eye drops (ofloxacin). I also tried the ointment (terramycin) but the eye drops are easier to give for me. I am also giving him a l-lysine treat a vet gave me, which taste amazing and so i give it to him after the eye drops as a "forgive me please" treat. The eyes seem to be doing better. The vet also said that they can test for the type of virus but those tests tend to have a lot of false negative and false positive, they're not very accurate. Do you guys have experience with this?

The vet also said that we could give him anti-viral if the eye don't clear in a week. But I read a bit about them and I am terrified at the idea. Do you guys know anything about antivirals?

I am bringing the kitten to the vet this Thur for her 3rd distemper shot and i will ask them to test her again for FIV/FeLV. She had been tested at two months old, now she is 4.5 month old.

Thank you so much for all help and support, it is really great to have a community one can rely on.
 

Antonio65

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I am treating the kitten with panacur and metronidazole for the giardia- it's been a struggle, the metro is so bitter, even the compound liquid, and to hold her and give her the syringe is not easy. But I keep at it. I am also cleaning the litterbox as soon as they go to the bathroom.
Wonderful, this is the right approach to the giardia.
My older cat had it too last year, two previous courses of Panacur didn't work, but Panacur and Metrodinazole, along with cleaning of the box at every use (and the whole house daily for at least a week!), did the job!

The vet also said that they can test for the type of virus but those tests tend to have a lot of false negative and false positive, they're not very accurate. Do you guys have experience with this?
I think I haven't understood what virus yor vet is talking about.

The vet also said that we could give him anti-viral if the eye don't clear in a week. But I read a bit about them and I am terrified at the idea. Do you guys know anything about antivirals?
I had two foster kittens that I treated with antiviral for their eyes, and it worked perfectly.

I am bringing the kitten to the vet this Thur for her 3rd distemper shot and i will ask them to test her again for FIV/FeLV. She had been tested at two months old, now she is 4.5 month old.
My first question: why is your kitten going to be treated with the third shot of distemper (panleukopenia)? What I knew is that one shot is past 10-12 weeks, the second is 4 weeks later, and if necessary a third shot is at least 6 months after the second one. All my cats have never received a third shot so close to each other. The third shot has always been a year after the second one. And the last trend of vets is to give the following shots not less than every three years.
My second question: do you know that testing a kitten that young with snap tests may still give false responses?
 
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catloveroc

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Thank you so much Antonio for helping out.

Re the giardia- how did you clean things like upholstery or some of their beds that cannot be thrown in the washing machine? Did you use bleach to clean everything? I wash their bowls every day, after every use, with dish soap.

Re my older cat- the vet did not say what type of virus my cat could have gotten. He just said he must have caught a pretty nasty virus. He said we could try and test for which virus he got so to figure out, but then he said the tests are inaccurate and the treatment would be the same.

Was the antiviral you used a giant pill?

Re the 3rd shot. I don't know why the vet is recommending a 3rd dose. I did ask because I also knew the kitten would only need a 2 dose. But the vet didn't say much, besides they usually give 3 doses to make sure they're covered. Shall I hold off to that?

I didn't know the FIV test could give false responses. This is certainly making me more anxious now and more guilty about having brought in another cat in the house. What do you recommend I do? Shall I wait a bit longer to get the kitten retested for FIV? She's 4.5months so probably young as you say. Or shall I test her now and then one more time in a couple months? I just want to do what's best for my older cat. I feel so guilty.

Thank you so much.
 

Antonio65

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Re the giardia- how did you clean things like upholstery or some of their beds that cannot be thrown in the washing machine? Did you use bleach to clean everything? I wash their bowls every day, after every use, with dish soap.
I bought some chlorhexidine foam that I would spray on beds and blankets, our kitchen chairs and everything was fabric.
What I had read is that bleach does little on giardia parasites in the environment, and the article advised more on what is called Quaternary Ammonium Salts. The name is scaring, but it is an easy to find product that I bought in a pet supplies store.
I live in Italy, so I can't help you with a brand name.

Re my older cat- the vet did not say what type of virus my cat could have gotten. He just said he must have caught a pretty nasty virus. He said we could try and test for which virus he got so to figure out, but then he said the tests are inaccurate and the treatment would be the same.
A vet that doesn't explain things isn't my favorite vet...
Furthermore, as far as I know, each virus can be tested singularly, I don't think there's a test that tells them all. So, unless the vet knows exactly what he's looking for, he should run several tests in order to spot the right virus.
So, I think he knows what he's looking for already, only he didn't tell you.

Was the antiviral you used a giant pill?
In my case it was small pill, but mainly an ointment to be applied on the eyes.

Re the 3rd shot. I don't know why the vet is recommending a 3rd dose. I did ask because I also knew the kitten would only need a 2 dose. But the vet didn't say much, besides they usually give 3 doses to make sure they're covered. Shall I hold off to that?
I would ask the vet why he wants to give your kitty a third shot so close to the second one. I would hold it for at least the minimum required time that should be 6 months, unless there is a more than valid reason, which he should explain.

I didn't know the FIV test could give false responses. This is certainly making me more anxious now and more guilty about having brought in another cat in the house. What do you recommend I do? Shall I wait a bit longer to get the kitten retested for FIV? She's 4.5months so probably young as you say. Or shall I test her now and then one more time in a couple months? I just want to do what's best for my older cat. I feel so guilty.
The test is for FIV and FeLV together.
The snap test, the kind of test that vets do in 10 minutes with just two drops of blood, can give false responses when kitty is very young, especially false negative responses to FIV, because the kitten might still have the maternal antibodies.
The test should be more reliable from 6 or 7 months of age.
Doing a test now and then repeating it in a couple months would be a waste of money.

My younger kitty was tested at the age of 2 months just to have a starting point, she tested positive to FIV, negative to FeLV.
I knew I couldn't rely on this results.
So I tested her again at 6 months, and again at 10 months. She always tested negative to both.
Because her mother is positive to FIV, and her siblings too, I was still unsure about the last result so I asked the vet to run a PCR test for FIV on the kitty marrow.
It is more expensive and the result comes in a week, but it is the only totally reliable way to know that for sure. I would ask your vet for this. The PCR test on the marrow is more invasive. It requires an anesthesia on the cat because they have to draw some bone marrow from their shoulder.
For my kitty, the result from the PCR test was negative too, now I'm really sure she doesn't have FIV.

Having a FIV cat introduced to a house where a resident healthy cat lives isn't a great issue. Unless they fight very hard with teeth and claws, it's nearly impossible to infect the healthy cat.
I would worry more about FeLV which is more easily transmissible, and the vaccine could not protect the cat completely.
 
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