HELP! Cat gasping / coughing / gagging?

[frazzfox]

If the vet checked her over and did x-rays, that should ease your mind a bit. Heart conditions,asthma, and many other conditions show up on x-rays. If she didn't cough for the first week, then allergies are teh most likely culprit! Stress from being in a new home and new diet, etc. (even though she may not exhibit stress signs, cats are good at hiding this) may very well haev reduced her immune level and she is getting a 'kitty cold'. the more info we get, the more and more it points to this! Just enjoy your new little one and try to relax, it DOES get easier!

Thanks so much for the kind words. I know we'll eventually get her idiosyncrasies figured out and then we'll be on the path to making her as comfortable as possible. Plus two weeks isn't all that long in cat time. But gee, wouldn't it be so much easier if they could just talk and tell you what the matter was!

Definitely try getting rid of the potato! That's what ended gassiness and vomiting for Edwina, our other cat. We have these cats on a very low-carb diet, which also seems to be a plus for keeping inflammation down. (In that interest, I've also cut out nearly all fish for Ireland.)

Oh no, I'm sorry to hear about the hack/cough! Yes, the litter box. Does Kila kick a lot in the box?

She's been eating a lot more of her food since we switched over to ones that don't have the potato (or peas for that matter) in them just a couple of days ago, and her poops have been more solid and regular as well. Hopefully that persists! I've been trying to feed her high protein, medium fat, low carb wet food. Fish maybe one or two meals a week (unless that ends up being the culprit).

Kila is indeed a digger in the box. She likes to get her nose in there too. She was sneezing with the first litter we got, now coughing with this one... fingers crossed this third option is it! Luckily it was on sale at Petsmart today.

 

[lisahe]

(or peas for that matter)

Yes, we skip any and all legumes, too!

I really hope the Dr. E's helps. (And good to know about the sale!) How interesting that Kila is a digger, too. Edwina doesn't do that. (She picks and pulls at the side of the box after using it, though, it can be very loud!)

 

[frazzfox]

Well, things were going pretty well until just about 10 minutes ago. She started getting the zoomies so I pulled out the laser pointer for a bit of play. After a few minutes of pretty aggressive play she sat down and had a few more gags / coughs. Lasted maybe 10 seconds or less. Now she’s grumbling and swallowing a lot again.

My partner’s telling me to relax, that the vet says she’s fine so she’s fine. But I wish I could just snap my fingers and fix this!!

 

[frazzfox]

Continuing to update... slept through the night okay but her breathing was quite noisy. This morning woke up and she had some loud diarrhea in the box. She had soft stool a day or two as well that I chalked up to the deworming medicine we'd given her.

May or may not be related to all of the rest of this stuff. I've been feeding her the same two foods for the last three days: Weruva Chicken Frick A 'Zee and Soulistic Turkey. She's also gotten a few Greenies tuna treats and we're brushing her teeth in the evenings due to gum inflammation so she gets a poultry-flavored enzymatic toothpaste. Should I look into changing her diet or should I wait? She's only been on the all-wet diet for about a week.

So far the list of her noticeable symptoms:

• Occasionally coughing / gagging
• Noisy breathing, grumbling (when sleeping particularly)
• Gassy, occasional diarrhea
• Scratching at herself, itchy
• Overgrooming (she's patchy on her sides and belly)

 

[Albus&minnie]

Continuing to update... slept through the night okay but her breathing was quite noisy. This morning woke up and she had some loud diarrhea in the box. She had soft stool a day or two as well that I chalked up to the deworming medicine we'd given her.

May or may not be related to all of the rest of this stuff. I've been feeding her the same two foods for the last three days: Weruva Chicken Frick A 'Zee and Soulistic Turkey. She's also gotten a few Greenies tuna treats and we're brushing her teeth in the evenings due to gum inflammation so she gets a poultry-flavored enzymatic toothpaste. Should I look into changing her diet or should I wait? She's only been on the all-wet diet for about a week.

So far the list of her noticeable symptoms:

• Occasionally coughing / gagging
• Noisy breathing, grumbling (when sleeping particularly)
• Gassy, occasional diarrhea
• Scratching at herself, itchy
• Overgrooming (she's patchy on her sides and belly)

Sorry ,i don't know much about cat health , i only got mine 2 weeks ago .
But , good luck with your kitty!

 

[lisahe]

Continuing to update... slept through the night okay but her breathing was quite noisy. This morning woke up and she had some loud diarrhea in the box. She had soft stool a day or two as well that I chalked up to the deworming medicine we'd given her.

May or may not be related to all of the rest of this stuff. I've been feeding her the same two foods for the last three days: Weruva Chicken Frick A 'Zee and Soulistic Turkey. She's also gotten a few Greenies tuna treats and we're brushing her teeth in the evenings due to gum inflammation so she gets a poultry-flavored enzymatic toothpaste. Should I look into changing her diet or should I wait? She's only been on the all-wet diet for about a week.

So far the list of her noticeable symptoms:

• Occasionally coughing / gagging
• Noisy breathing, grumbling (when sleeping particularly)
• Gassy, occasional diarrhea
• Scratching at herself, itchy
• Overgrooming (she's patchy on her sides and belly)

Oh no, I'm sorry to hear this! To me (clearly not a professional!) this sounds like sensitivities or allergies of some sort(s). Probably along with a good deal of stress since she was only recently adopted and has had a lot of changes in the last couple weeks. Cats are such creatures of habit! They can take a fair bit of time to adapt to new homes. Everything on this list at least could be related to some sort of inflammation caused by sensitivities or allergies, worsened by stress.

Personally, I think the first dietary change I'd make would be to take the tuna treats off the menu and then wait at least a few days to see if things normalize. The first ingredients are: Chicken meal, wheat, brown rice, corn gluten meal. And wheat and corn can cause problems in some cats. (This is a case where it's probably not the fish: it looks like these only have tuna flavor!)

It's hard to say but if those symptoms continue, I'd consider calling the vet and going through that list of symptoms. It's hard to say if they're caused by food or something environmental (in either case, there's always way too much to choose from!) though I think the coughing would concern me most since respiratory disease can be so intermittent and difficult to fully diagnose.

 

[frazzfox]

Sorry ,i don't know much about cat health , i only got mine 2 weeks ago .
But , good luck with your kitty!

Thank you!! I don't know much about cat health either, despite growing up with a ton of them. I was a kid and my parents absorbed all of the health responsibilities of our animals (and, apparently, the stress that comes with that)! Good luck with your new kitty as well!

Personally, I think the first dietary change I'd make would be to take the tuna treats off the menu and then wait at least a few days to see if things normalize. The first ingredients are: Chicken meal, wheat, brown rice, corn gluten meal. And wheat and corn can cause problems in some cats. (This is a case where it's probably not the fish: it looks like these only have tuna flavor!)

Yes, this is exactly what we're doing! I'm taking her off the treats (and toothpaste possibly? though I haven't seen anything online about cats developing allergies to it) and will continue feeding the Chicken Frick A 'Zee for a few days to see what that does. That canned food does have gums and fish oil in it, which potentially could be triggers if I find out the treats aren't it. If she continues to have problems, especially the diarrhea and gas, I'll switch to our other chicken food, Paw Lickin' Chicken. That does have potato starch but no guar gum or fish oil. And then if nothing changes at that point I'll start trying other proteins.

If she gets much worse, or enough time passes with no improvement, we'll try to get a second vet opinion. In any case thanks a lot for being here to offer suggestions and listen to me think out loud, it helps a lot.

 

[lisahe]

Yes, this is exactly what we're doing! I'm taking her off the treats (and toothpaste possibly? though I haven't seen anything online about cats developing allergies to it) and will continue feeding the Chicken Frick A 'Zee for a few days to see what that does. That canned food does have gums and fish oil in it, which potentially could be triggers if I find out the treats aren't it. If she continues to have problems, especially the diarrhea and gas, I'll switch to our other chicken food, Paw Lickin' Chicken. That does have potato starch but no guar gum or fish oil. And then if nothing changes at that point I'll start trying other proteins.

If she gets much worse, or enough time passes with no improvement, we'll try to get a second vet opinion. In any case thanks a lot for being here to offer suggestions and listen to me think out loud, it helps a lot.

Good, I'm glad you're cutting the treats first. If you're looking for a treat, Pure Bites (just plain freeze-dried chicken) are really popular with our cats. How does Kila handle having her teeth brushed? If she doesn't especially like it, I might try skipping it for a while, to limit stress. Ireland has CET poultry toothpaste and Edwina prefers seafood -- neither has any problems with it. But you never know.

And the food, yes, sorting through the ingredients is such a hassle! Which is why being able to think out loud here can be so helpful. (I did a fair bit of that, too, when we were trying to figure out Edwina's barf causers. Which turned out to be agar-agar and mussels! It took a bunch of mistakes to get there, though.) It generally seems like gums tend to be more problematic than fish oil but it's always hard to say. (And you can almost always find some cat who has a problem with just about anything!)

Okay, fingers crossed, as always!

 

[frazzfox]

Another update... partner just messaged me to let me know the poor girl's eye is now closed and watering. What in the world?? This poor little thing is falling apart. I suppose we're going to have to take her back in for a third time now... the poor little thing is so stressed out at this point I have no idea what to think anymore. Stress, allergies, respiratory infection?? Calling the vet now...

EDIT (update): Called the vet and they wanted her to come back in for blood testing based on the new symptoms. Talked to my partner about it and he wants to wait at least a few more days to see if this starts to resolve itself on its own. If stress is a factor then taking her to the vet again is just going to aggravate things. He also wants us to keep her on her current food for a few more days before changing it.

 

[Albus&minnie]

Another update... partner just messaged me to let me know the poor girl's eye is now closed and watering. What in the world?? This poor little thing is falling apart. I suppose we're going to have to take her back in for a third time now... the poor little thing is so stressed out at this point I have no idea what to think anymore. Stress, allergies, respiratory infection?? Calling the vet now...

EDIT (update): Called the vet and they wanted her to come back in for blood testing based on the new symptoms. Talked to my partner about it and he wants to wait at least a few more days to see if this starts to resolve itself on its own. If stress is a factor then taking her to the vet again is just going to aggravate things. He also wants us to keep her on her current food for a few more days before changing it.

Again , good luck kitty!

 

[She's a witch]

Another update... partner just messaged me to let me know the poor girl's eye is now closed and watering. What in the world?? This poor little thing is falling apart. I suppose we're going to have to take her back in for a third time now... the poor little thing is so stressed out at this point I have no idea what to think anymore. Stress, allergies, respiratory infection?? Calling the vet now...

EDIT (update): Called the vet and they wanted her to come back in for blood testing based on the new symptoms. Talked to my partner about it and he wants to wait at least a few more days to see if this starts to resolve itself on its own. If stress is a factor then taking her to the vet again is just going to aggravate things. He also wants us to keep her on her current food for a few more days before changing it.

If you decide to take her back after all, there’s also an URI test you can ask her to do: PCR Respiratory Panel. It could give you some answers before she’s given any antibiotics without prior tests. It’s pricey but it checks for several different pathogens, both viruses (herpes&calici viruses) and some bacteria (mycoplasma, bortadella etc, depending on the laboratory). I think one of the symptoms of mycoplasma&bortadella can be coughing so it may be worth checking.
Good luck, I hope she’ll be better!

 

[frazzfox]

If you decide to take her back after all, there’s also an URI test you can ask her to do: PCR Respiratory Panel. It could give you some answers before she’s given any antibiotics without prior tests. It’s pricey but it checks for several different pathogens, both viruses (herpes&calici viruses) and some bacteria (mycoplasma, bortadella etc, depending on the laboratory). I think one of the symptoms of mycoplasma&bortadella can be coughing so it may be worth checking.
Good luck, I hope she’ll be better!

Thank you for the guidance and the well wishes! We were offered antibiotics when she got the x-ray earlier this week but I declined because she hadn't been diagnosed with anything.

 

[She's a witch]

Thank you for the guidance and the well wishes! We were offered antibiotics when she got the x-ray earlier this week but I declined because she hadn't been diagnosed with anything.

That is pretty common and actually, most cat owners are happy to be given antibiotics without any tests. And sometimes it’s somewhat understandable if the symptoms are very clear and the vet has a legitimate guess on what’s happening. But as I rule, I never allow it, I always ask for any tests first. The test I mentioned is not popular for some reason, the price is problematic, but imo it’s always better to know what it’s dealt with instead of throwing several antibiotics on a cat, hoping something will work. They can also do a culture if she has any discharge, it could be cheaper.

 

[Furballsmom]

see if this starts to resolve itself on its own.

I wouldn't wait, let me repeat - don't wait. Now that the eye is involved this is obviously getting more serious, and not to get in the middle of a family discussion, but also why stay with the food - I'm not sure what the point is regarding waiting with this either? Those two foods you mentioned are the same brand? I'd suggest to try a different brand - even fancy feast at this point.

Your cat is in quite rough condition and is getting worse, not better.

Try and get her in to the vet as soon as you can.

 

[lisahe]

If you decide to take her back after all, there’s also an URI test you can ask her to do: PCR Respiratory Panel. It could give you some answers before she’s given any antibiotics without prior tests. It’s pricey but it checks for several different pathogens, both viruses (herpes&calici viruses) and some bacteria (mycoplasma, bortadella etc, depending on the laboratory). I think one of the symptoms of mycoplasma&bortadella can be coughing so it may be worth checking.
Good luck, I hope she’ll be better!

This could be really helpful, particularly if Kila did have a URI along the way; herpes is pretty common. (I don't remember if our previous cat was diagnosed with having a herpes URI or if that was the typical URI at the shelter at the time we adopted her so everybody assumed that was the one she had, but I remember it being mentioned multiple times. Brooksie would sometimes get minor recurrences of symptoms: little sneezes, slightly runny eye. Our other cat's eyes were very, very goopy when she had her URI.) Anyway, given the eye problem, frazzfox , I think it would be great if you could check with the shelter about URIs.

Runny eyes sometimes resolve themselves very, very quickly. But they also need to be watched. I once had a cat who had a very slightly runny eye in the morning. (Just barely enough to be noticeable.) But when I came home from work that evening, the side of her head had puffed up: she had broken a tooth and it abscessed. The vet pulled it, she went on antibiotics, and everything was fine but it was pretty scary. This is probably relatively unusual but it happened very quickly, during the course of a workday, so I am always very careful not to ignore runny eyes!

 

[frazzfox]

Hi all, it's been about a week so I wanted to update you on how Kila's doing. Bit of a lengthy update:

We ended up consulting a different vet at the same veterinary practice who has more experience working with cats. He was wonderful to talk to, very knowledgeable, and excellent with our girl. He diagnosed her with a URI and attributed most of her symptoms (congestion, sneezing, drippy nose/eyes, sleepiness) to that. He said her watering eyes are from conjunctivitis, a byproduct of the URI. Poor girl ended up getting it in both eyes and was prescribed tobramycin drops to quell any secondary infections.

I decided to switch her food ASAP as suggested so as to rule out sensitivity to one of the ingredients. I decided to go with the Instinct limited ingredient diet turkey wet food and, sure enough, her poops went back to normal in less than a day! I'll be keeping her on this food for a while until she's feeling all better and then may look into rotating in other wet food flavors.

We did switch her litter to the respiratory relief litter, and just in case allergies are involved somehow, we cleaned the apartment top to bottom as best as we could and turned on an air filter / purifier.

We went back to the vet today for a follow-up appointment to see how she's doing since her eyes are still red and she's still sneezing, sniffling, and generally sleepy, though she's a lot better than she was this weekend. At this point she's been showing symptoms for about 11 days, which is still within the reasonable timeframe for healing up. The vet didn't test for herpesvirus but said it's very possible she may have it since many cats do, and that the illness could have been triggered by the stress of the move. We do have her on lysine.

The vet checked out her eyes again and saw that they're still a little inflamed (though she's not as sensitive to light now and they're not as goopy), and she's been pawing at her them/trying to itch them a lot, so he told us to stop the tobramycin since she may be experiencing irritation from it and switch to Neo Poly Dex. We're supposed to do a course of that from today until next Thursday.

He also recommended a fish oil supplement that might reduce inflammation that could be causing her scratching/grooming, and also just for general coat/skin health. We noticed that her pawpads are quite dry and that she's been biting on them so this should help.

We asked about the coughing again. She's done it two other times since that first time, though this last time it sounded like she might have been trying to hack something up, and she stopped as soon as I walked over to her. The doctor said to continue monitoring it and see if it goes away as the URI symptoms do. If it persists beyond the other symptoms we will have to run some more tests on her to see if it's allergy / asthma related.

He also recommended that we do a blood panel at some point, and suggested that we may want to coincide it with a teeth cleaning since he noticed that she has some plaque and her gums are a bit inflamed (the first vet that we saw noticed this too) and they'll have to draw blood for that as well.

Throughout it all she's still been eating like a champ (she LOVES this new food, and we mix water into it to make sure she's hydrated). She's still playful, using the litterbox without issue now, etc. And the vet says that's all good signs. He also said we can feel free to call him at any point with follow-up questions, which is a big relief to me. Fingers crossed that she's fully healed up as soon as possible!

 

[Furballsmom]

Thank you so much for this update -you ROCK!

 

[lisahe]

I'm so glad to hear your update, frazzfox , I'd been wondering how Kila is doing! It sounds like you found a very good vet for her -- that really can make all the difference, particularly when they're cat specialists.

Fingers crossed (again!) that she continues to improve!

 

[frazzfox]

The saga continues...

Kila seems to get a little better and then a little worse. It's been 2 weeks and a day since symptoms first arose. Everything started about 12 days into us having her. I don't believe the cough is URI related at this point.

Yesterday I noticed that she seemed to be particularly tired and that her breathing was a bit off. I counted the breaths and she seemed to fall within the normal range, though a little high for being at rest. I could see her side moving while she breathed. She was a little less hungry at dinnertime than normal and a little less playful, but I chalked it up to residual symptoms from the URI.

Early this morning, she had a bad coughing attack. It lasted about 30-40 seconds and sounded different than the coughs in the video I attached to the first post. It sounded kind of like a little kid coughing, and she was in a posture very similar to the videos I've seen on Youtube describing cat asthma. I caught a few seconds of her cough on video to show the vet. Eventually she settled down, though her breathing still was elevated and she seemed agitated. She tried to run around and play a little like she usually does in the morning but doing so triggered more coughing, so she just curled up and went to sleep. She's been resting under our futon since then (though she did perk up to eat breakfast).

I called the vet the minute the office opened and he asked us to bring her in again for some more testing, so we made an appointment for first thing tomorrow. They want to take another X-Ray, listen to her breathing again, and then potentially refer us to an internist to better diagnose her. This will be her fourth time at the vet in a month and I feel so bad for dragging her there over and over again, but I'm desperate to figure out what's going on. Fingers perpetually crossed that we can eventually get to the bottom of this.

 

[Furballsmom]

Oh, sweet baby, hang in there!!