My cat has had diarrhea for 2 months

OreoOwner

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HI Everyone!

My family rescued our cat on Christmas eve and ever since we have got him, he has had the runs. Never a solid stool. Not once. He is very energetic, playful, and has a great appetite.

I have taken him to the vets about a month ago who gave him another round of deworming just in case as well as some gastro food and told us if that doesnt work to come back for some hypoallergenic food after 2 weeks.

There was no improvement after 2 weeks and he is now on the Royal Canin Selected Protein PD dry food diet. We are on about day 4 of it.

Just wondering if anyone has any ideas of what this could be? There is no blood of mucus or anything in his stools. Its just normal color. The vet said that if this food doesnt work that they could test the stool but it may be costly.

All vaccines are up to date as well when we rescued him.

He is about 8 months old.

Thank you all so much for your input
 

Mr. Meow

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HI Everyone!

My family rescued our cat on Christmas eve and ever since we have got him, he has had the runs. Never a solid stool. Not once. He is very energetic, playful, and has a great appetite.

I have taken him to the vets about a month ago who gave him another round of deworming just in case as well as some gastro food and told us if that doesnt work to come back for some hypoallergenic food after 2 weeks.

There was no improvement after 2 weeks and he is now on the Royal Canin Selected Protein PD dry food diet. We are on about day 4 of it.

Just wondering if anyone has any ideas of what this could be? There is no blood of mucus or anything in his stools. Its just normal color. The vet said that if this food doesnt work that they could test the stool but it may be costly.

All vaccines are up to date as well when we rescued him.

He is about 8 months old.

Thank you all so much for your input
Try some boiled chicken or purée pumpkin. Both of those are great at making kitties regular.
 
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OreoOwner

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I have powdered pumpkin powder would that work? I had used it before but didnt work on his old food.

Would the store bought Pumpkin puree work? like the ones you use for pie filling?
 

verna davies

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Try s boulardii, mix half a capsule in the food twice a day, you should see an improvement within 5 days, I have had a lot of success with it. Could he be allergic to something in the food, chicken is often a cause.
 

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My cats get diarrhea from all RC food, they have quite a bit of ingredients that could cause gastro upset, what were you feeding him before? I’d compare those ingredients to the RC and try to ferret out a culprit
 

Mr. Meow

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As long as it's pure pumpkin and has no additives like spices or other flavors, then either should work. Just a spoonful with each meal, or twice a day.
 
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OreoOwner

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My cats get diarrhea from all RC food, they have quite a bit of ingredients that could cause gastro upset, what were you feeding him before? I’d compare those ingredients to the RC and try to ferret out a culprit

Thanks so much. He was on Performatrin when we rescued him so we just continued that at their recommendation.

if this Hypoallergenic food doesnt work I will try something else I think
 

crouton

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Thanks so much. He was on Performatrin when we rescued him so we just continued that at their recommendation.

if this Hypoallergenic food doesnt work I will try something else I think
Performstrin has a lot of varieties. I’d compare the one you were feeding him to the rc
 
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OreoOwner

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Performstrin has a lot of varieties. I’d compare the one you were feeding him to the rc

Thanks but he had the runs while on that food as well so I think I may need to try something different
 

crouton

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Thanks but he had the runs while on that food as well so I think I may need to try something different
Yes I get it. I’m telling you to see what the ingredients are in the performatrin and compare them to the one he’s on now to see if they gave any ingredients in common that could still be causing the diarrhea. Since they both caused it.
 

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4 days of diet isn't going to help. You need to feed the food for at least 13 weeks to see if it helps or not.

A limited ingredient brand of food might be better than Royal Canin. There are lots of commercially available brands in both dry and canned. It's ok to feed something else than what the vet recommends / suggests.

BLUE Basics® Limited Ingredient Cat Food | Blue Buffalo
Limited Ingredient Diet - Grain Free Cat | Merrick Pet Care
Cat Food - Limited Ingredient Diet - Kohapet
Instinct Limited Ingredient Diet | Instinct Pet Food
RAWZ | 100% Rendered Free Cat Food
Grain Free Wet Recipes - NutriSource Pet Foods (not exactly an LID food but some of the canned are novel protein)


Would the store bought Pumpkin puree work? like the ones you use for pie filling?

No, not pumpkin pie filling. That contains spices and other things. You want plain 100% pumpkin puree. Libby's is one big name brand but store generic will work and costs less.

 

10thomer

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One of my cats has TERRIBLE diarrhea when she was young (1-2 y.o.) which the vet initially suspected was due to giardia or some other parasite/infection but actually just ended up being IBD. She never once had a solid stool, and actually leaked diarrhea all over my apartment which was emotionally difficult to deal with.

We got her on budesonide and that finally got it to where she has "soft serve" stool rather than leaky liquid diarrhea but I didn't want to keep her on it for her whole life. So I started doing limited ingredient diets from a single protein source and ended up settling on chicken as the protein source that didn't irritate her GI tract. Also important to note is that we didn't see a full improvement until we switched her entirely to wet food; she literally cannot have any amount of dry food, as it sets off her IBD. I was then able to wean her off of the budesonide and she's been happy as a clam for several years now.

I'm not sure if this is what's going on with your kitty, but may be worth looking into if nothing else seems to be working!
 

daftcat75

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Have you had his stool checked for intestinal infection? Ask your vet about a Diarrhea PCR test. You'll likely bring in about a pea's worth of poop, double baggied, and possibly kept in the fridge if you can't run it down fresh. Ask your vet. They'll tell you how much to collect and how to store it if you can't run it down to them fresh. There are two (at least two) poop tests. One checks for worms and parasites. The other sequences the bacteria found in the poop and reports the mix of good and bad strains. This second one is a lot more expensive than the first one. If you did a poop test and you didn't spend a few hundred dollars, you probably had the first one done.

Here's some advice on how to treat the diarrhea until you can find its cause:
My Cat Has Diarrhea - What Do I Do?

If it's not a gut bug, then it's probably a food allergy or intolerance. If you can switch him to a single wet food, hopefully one with not many fillers like Fancy Feast Classic Pate in the Turkey and Giblets flavor (doesn't contain fish) or Tiki Cat (in a non-fish flavor), this will help you narrow down the culprits by narrowing his universe of food ingredients. Dry food doesn't have enough moisture and has way too many nonsense ingredients to conduct food trials. You might find his problem clears up just getting him off the dry food.

Rawz pates are the gold standard for IBD diets because they truly are limited ingredient and single protein. They are also hard to find and expensive. But Rawz will send you samples if you write them.
Where to Buy | RAWZ

Finally, you could try to prepare his diet using the EZ Complete powder and store bought meat.
EZComplete Premix Information
 
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One of my cats has TERRIBLE diarrhea when she was young (1-2 y.o.) which the vet initially suspected was due to giardia or some other parasite/infection but actually just ended up being IBD. She never once had a solid stool, and actually leaked diarrhea all over my apartment which was emotionally difficult to deal with.

We got her on budesonide and that finally got it to where she has "soft serve" stool rather than leaky liquid diarrhea but I didn't want to keep her on it for her whole life. So I started doing limited ingredient diets from a single protein source and ended up settling on chicken as the protein source that didn't irritate her GI tract. Also important to note is that we didn't see a full improvement until we switched her entirely to wet food; she literally cannot have any amount of dry food, as it sets off her IBD. I was then able to wean her off of the budesonide and she's been happy as a clam for several years now.

I'm not sure if this is what's going on with your kitty, but may be worth looking into if nothing else seems to be working!

That is my problem! My cat leaks around our house too! its quite annoying! I will try the limited ingredient diet and thats very interesting about wet food.

May I ask what you have yours on?
 

crouton

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That is my problem! My cat leaks around our house too! its quite annoying! I will try the limited ingredient diet and thats very interesting about wet food.

May I ask what you have yours on?
Are you sure the cat is leaking diarrhea and not anal gland secretions?
 
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OreoOwner

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Are you sure the cat is leaking diarrhea and not anal gland secretions?
Yeah I am sure. No matter where we are on the main floor, we can hear him going to the washroom lol
 

crouton

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Yeah I am sure. No matter where we are on the main floor, we can hear him going to the washroom lol
i mean the bits leaking around the house, its possible to have diarrhea/constipation and then leak some anal gland juice as they use the anal glands when going poop. Sometimes they get impacted or just leak.
 
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OreoOwner

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i mean the bits leaking around the house, its possible to have diarrhea/constipation and then leak some anal gland juice as they use the anal glands when going poop. Sometimes they get impacted or just leak.

Ahh I see what your saying.

We are sure its poop as sadly my wife has stepped in it and when I clean it off the floor its the same consistency and color of his poop from the litterbox
 

10thomer

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That is my problem! My cat leaks around our house too! its quite annoying! I will try the limited ingredient diet and thats very interesting about wet food.

May I ask what you have yours on?
Sure thing! So we have been feeding her Blue Buffalo Wilderness Mature Chicken Recipe Canned food for several years now, and recently added in a daily snack of half a can Wellness Core Signature Selects Skipjack Tuna & Shrimp which she actually seems to be tolerating well.
 
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