Possible Ringworm?

[Zizi0202]

Hi everyone! I am a long time lurker on TCS and have never had a reason or issue to post about until now...after reading so many of your horror stories and comments about ringworm, I am ready to start pulling my hair out!!

I have a 1.5 yo male DSH, who DH rescued from the streets of Brooklyn when he was barely a few weeks old and his mother had been killed. We immediately took him to the vet for a comprehensive exam and subsequently gave him all his shots and dewormed him.

His health has always been excellent without fail until recently. I took him to the vet for his annual shots and things didn’t go well. He was so scared and they had to hold him down very aggressively on the table to give him the rabies vaccine. He was pissed off, but calmed down when we got home and things seemed fine.

A few days later I noticed a patch of hair missing from between his shoulder blades and the area was red and inflamed. He started itching and there was a LOT of dandruff and skin flakes. Per the vet it was likely mechanical injury where they had held him down by the scruff of his neck. They told me to wait it out. A few days later I noticed the spot was getting bigger and there was a new spot as well. I decided to go for a second opinion.

The new vet also thought it was a mechanical injury from them holding him down by the scruff. More time went on and another spot popped up. We went back to the second vet. She checked for ringworm with the Woods light and nothing showed up. She decided to take a culture, which eventually came back negative. she also considered the possibility of food allergies.

Woods light and culture were both negative for ringworm. She gave me topical miconazole which didn’t help. Then we tried oral itraconazole which was compounded by a pharmacy...

The spots cleared up and hair grew back!! However after three weeks of giving the oral meds, I got extremely busy this last week and stopped giving to him on a regular basis. He has been itching a lot and now he has a new spot between his shoulder blades. I feel absolutely terrible for not finishing the full month dose that the vet gave me. Our second cat has shown no symptoms as of yet and the two share spaces throughout the house.

My question is, is it likely to be ringworm since the itraconazole helped? Is it common for the culture to come back negative? Now I’m not sure how to judge progress since the culture is already negative...

Also read online that some staph infections can look like ringworm. But would Itraconazole help the spots clear up if it were a staph infection?

Any advice would be appreciated and I have attached a picture of the spots as well. Am praying it might be a bacterial infection rather than ringworm after reading what others on the forum have gone through.

 

[Zizi0202]

Omg sorry for picture overload!! It won’t let me edit it now

 

[FeebysOwner]

Hi! The med that the vet gave you is typically used for fungal infections - including ringworm - caused by yeast cells. And, unfortunately it may not have had time to completely eradicate the infection since you weren't able to complete the full treatment. It is also my understanding that using a topical treatment during and even beyond the oral med is the best way to completely get rid of the infection. You might want to talk to the vet about restarting the combination treatment so that a full course can be completed.

Ringworm is contagious, but I think other forms of fungal infections may not be. So, it does seem odd that this would be ringworm and not have been transferred to your other cat.

Was the culture your vet did a skin scraping? If so, did she test for anything else? If not, you might want to consider asking the vet about taking a skin scraping to see if that might help identify what type of infection it might be. There are environmental allergies, such as mold, dust, and even grass that can cause fungal infections in cats as well.

Btw, once you are a member for 5 days, and reach 20 posts, you'll have the option to edit message for 120 minutes. Here is some related member information:
Promotions and Benefits

 

[Zizi0202]

Hi! The med that the vet gave you is typically used for fungal infections - including ringworm - caused by yeast cells. And, unfortunately it may not have had time to completely eradicate the infection since you weren't able to complete the full treatment. It is also my understanding that using a topical treatment during and even beyond the oral med is the best way to completely get rid of the infection. You might want to talk to the vet about restarting the combination treatment so that a full course can be completed.

Ringworm is contagious, but I think other forms of fungal infections may not be. So, it does seem odd that this would be ringworm and not have been transferred to your other cat.

Was the culture your vet did a skin scraping? If so, did she test for anything else? If not, you might want to consider asking the vet about taking a skin scraping to see if that might help identify what type of infection it might be. There are environmental allergies, such as mold, dust, and even grass that can cause fungal infections in cats as well.

Btw, once you are a member for 5 days, and reach 20 posts, you'll have the option to edit message for 120 minutes. Here is some related member information:
Promotions and Benefits

Thanks for the reply! Yes she did take a skin scraping but I believe all they tested it for was ringworm. And it came back negative. I’ve been wondering if a false negative is common/possible with ringworm?

I am going back to the vet on Friday to do full bloodwork for both of them and to see if we can restart the meds...I just really want a concrete diagnosis, I would feel so much better. For now I am going to start the cleaning routing I read about on the forum and keep my fingers crossed until the vet does bloodwork!

 

[FeebysOwner]

Typically, a culture must be done via a lab that the vet works with - and some can take up to a couple of weeks to confirm not only ringworm, but other fungal infections as well. Did that kind of culturing occur? If all the vet did was confirm yeast was involved, that does not confirm or rule out ringworm - or any other fungal infection for that matter. The culture is analyzed to see what type of yeast is causing the infection, which then might identify a different type of treatment. If a full culture growth was not done, a false negative result could happen.

And, generally speaking it could take up to 3 weeks for a ringworm infection to show up in your other cat. If it has been longer than that, one of two things are occurring: 1.) it is not ringworm, or 2.) your other cat actually has ringworm but is asymptomatic. I would ask the vet about that too.

Having blood work done as well, is a good idea!!

 

[Zizi0202]

Typically, a culture must be done via a lab that the vet works with - and some can take up to a couple of weeks to confirm not only ringworm, but other fungal infections as well. Did that kind of culturing occur? If all the vet did was confirm yeast was involved, that does not confirm or rule out ringworm - or any other fungal infection for that matter. The culture is analyzed to see what type of yeast is causing the infection, which then might identify a different type of treatment. If a full culture growth was not done, a false negative result could happen.

And, generally speaking it could take up to 3 weeks for a ringworm infection to show up in your other cat. If it has been longer than that, one of two things are occurring: 1.) it is not ringworm, or 2.) your other cat actually has ringworm but is asymptomatic. I would ask the vet about that too.

Having blood work done as well, is a good idea!!

Thank you so much for taking the time to respond. And yes that’s actually exactly what they did. It took about 3 weeks after being sent to the lab and the vet called me to let us know that the culture didn’t come back with anything. I think I’ll ask more specifically what they tested for when I go there on Friday. To be honest I don’t know if they only tested for ringworm or for other fungal infections, they just told me that everything came back clear.

Actually now that I think of it, it hasn’t been more than 3 weeks with them together. Our second cat was a feral rescue who we got about 1 week after his missing hair patch popped up. We kept them separate for the first month and a half because they weren’t getting along. They have been together now approximately 1 week so maybe it hasn’t been long enough for symptoms to show.

I wish now that I hadn’t put them together
And am hoping she won’t get it too! Although today I just saw her scratching her neck. I made an appointment for her as well to get checked next week.

Do you think there’s any point in separating them now or since they’ve already mingled they are both likely infected? I am going to try to remove all curtains, linens, and fabrics today from the living room which is where the two of them mainly hang out. And unfortunately we have air vents through our duct system and I have read that will continue to spread spores from room to room.

 

[FeebysOwner]

I would ask the vet about that - do they think you will need to treat both, or keep them separate and only treat the one? I have heard of cats getting ringworm and not having any outward signs, so that is the part that would concern me. If it is not outwardly visible, but your second cat has it, then she can spread it to the other cat even after his treatment is completed.

I still hope you find out what other fungal infections they tested for - or, if they did...

I'll let others who have had to deal with ringworm in a multi-cat household give their first hand advice.

 

[Zizi0202]

Yes I will definitely ask her when I am there in a few days. Just checked my receipt and it reads “dermatophyte culture” but there’s no other info. I attached a picture of my receipt that shows everything they did for him. They also gave him a cortisone injection to see if there was any improvement since they also thought it could be a food allergy (there was no improvement unfortunately).

Thanks again for your input!

 

[FeebysOwner]

You might want to read this article (if you haven't already) on dermatophyte and deep fungal infections. It is not terribly long and was pretty easy to read.

http://veterinarycalendar.dvm360.co...infections-proceedings?id=&pageID=1&sk=&date=

 

[hiya_unicorns]

Both my cats got ringworm a couple years back, I only notice cause the skin looked a bit red/crusty but didn't really look so severely red as your pictures. My other cat's looked just sort of scabby/crusty but not red at all. Neither fully lost fur, just very crusty, so maybe the appearance varies by cat (I actually got it too, and it looked more circular, like ringworm). They both tested positive with the UV light and after weeks of medications (oral and topical) they recovered, even though it really didn't cause them any discomfort except for me harassing them twice a day with medications. I would think if they did the skin culture that would be very conclusive, but I don't know what else it could be.

I was told by my vet that sometimes some cats don't show ringworm symptoms and just carry the spores around. It will take some time to get everything disinfected but don't feel discourage if it is ringworm. Try to keep the cats in one area after it's disinfected. I covered all my furniture with white sheets and would swap and wash weekly. I would use lysol spray and bleach, even though I never clean with bleach I would use this on my hard surfaces but diluted with hot water. Steam clean the carpets. I even would wash their soft fuzzy toys every few days to make sure. I had a cat tree, but I ended up just getting rid of it and didn't get them a new one until after they were cured. Just set them up a basic scratching post. I think if you can contain them in a specific area for a 4 week time frame while they're recovering that is best to keep them from releasing spores over and over again everywhere in the house. Vacuuming is important, I did this a lot and then could bleach clean my filters and canister. I didn't go so far as to clean out all my ducts, it seems after they got cure and I kept up a good cleaning routine for several weeks everything got back to normal for us.

Good luck! I hope you discover the cause very soon!

 

[Zizi0202]

You might want to read this article (if you haven't already) on dermatophyte and deep fungal infections. It is not terribly long and was pretty easy to read.

http://veterinarycalendar.dvm360.co...infections-proceedings?id=&pageID=1&sk=&date=

TFS! No I hadn’t read it, so thank you for the info. Now I see what you mean more about the fungal culture. I am going to find out more about what exactly they did. I feel like if it was ringworm it seems that it should have shown up on the fungal culture. I guess it’s likely not the M Canis strain or it would have glowed with the Woods light and the culture. Maybe it’s a different ringworm strain or some other dermatological issue that manifests in a similar way as ringworm. The article mentions there are other issues that sometimes have similar symptoms. I’ll bring this up at his next visit for sure. Thanks

 

[FeebysOwner]

Keep us posted!!

 

[Zizi0202]

Both my cats got ringworm a couple years back, I only notice cause the skin looked a bit red/crusty but didn't really look so severely red as your pictures. My other cat's looked just sort of scabby/crusty but not red at all. Neither fully lost fur, just very crusty, so maybe the appearance varies by cat (I actually got it too, and it looked more circular, like ringworm). They both tested positive with the UV light and after weeks of medications (oral and topical) they recovered, even though it really didn't cause them any discomfort except for me harassing them twice a day with medications. I would think if they did the skin culture that would be very conclusive, but I don't know what else it could be.

I was told by my vet that sometimes some cats don't show ringworm symptoms and just carry the spores around. It will take some time to get everything disinfected but don't feel discourage if it is ringworm. Try to keep the cats in one area after it's disinfected. I covered all my furniture with white sheets and would swap and wash weekly. I would use lysol spray and bleach, even though I never clean with bleach I would use this on my hard surfaces but diluted with hot water. Steam clean the carpets. I even would wash their soft fuzzy toys every few days to make sure. I had a cat tree, but I ended up just getting rid of it and didn't get them a new one until after they were cured. Just set them up a basic scratching post. I think if you can contain them in a specific area for a 4 week time frame while they're recovering that is best to keep them from releasing spores over and over again everywhere in the house. Vacuuming is important, I did this a lot and then could bleach clean my filters and canister. I didn't go so far as to clean out all my ducts, it seems after they got cure and I kept up a good cleaning routine for several weeks everything got back to normal for us.

Good luck! I hope you discover the cause very soon!

Thanks for sharing I am hoping it’s not actually ringworm, but if it is I’m glad to have this forum where so many have already gone through the same thing!

I also thought the skin culture would be conclusive (and at almost $170 it should be! Lol). But the vet told me it can sometimes come back as a false negative.

So she decided to try and treat with itraconazole anyways. I did notice a drastic improvement and all his hair started growing back until he stopped taking it and now he has a new spot. I am wondering if it’s some other type of fungal infection since the itraconazole helped.

I’m in the process of washing everything. My washing machine has a sanitize option that goes for 2 hours on high heat so I’m going to do as much as I can today. As for the carpet and furniture I’m at a loss. Most of it is new and I would feel terrible to toss it. I read somewhere that someone used foot spray on the couch and am wondering if that would be safe for the kitties. Did you successfully use the bleach on hardwood floors? Also heard about accel on amazon where a lot of people say they are using it at rescues and kennels.

Did you buy a new vacuum or just stick with the one you had? I saw a lot of people recommended buying a new one and also the Miele C3 but when I looked up the prices I almost had a heart attack!

Sorry for so many questions I’m just relieved to hear from others who have gone through it and made it out alive with their sanity intact!! Thanks

 

[hiya_unicorns]

No problem! I didn't have hardwoods at the time, just tile/laminate the bleach did fine. But because of my past experience with ringworm and my fear of it just being anywhere when I moved into my new place (just a couple months ago) with hardwoods I got a steam mop, and I read that the heat from those can kill off the spores, so I did a big cleaning just to be safe before the cats moved in! I didn't get rid of any of my furniture or bedding, I just made sure to clean everything thoroughly pretty often (used a steam cleaner for my fabric furniture and carpet) and then once I got a good clean of it I just wrapped places like the couch/chair (places the cats would spend time) with cheap white sheets and would clean those regularly. I still have that furniture to this day and I haven't had a re-occurrence of ringworm in almost 3 years (will be 3 this summer).

I also have the same vacuum, I have a pretty nice shark one and didn't want to have to trash it! I just took it apart and soaked the filters and attachments in bleach and would clean the canister in bleach. I think some people say buy a really cheap one that you can trash later, but I didn't find the need for it. Haven't tried the foot spray but makes sense! It is an anti fungal but not sure about how it will be around cats. I didn't really use anything else special besides lysol and bleach on hard surfaces I had (I mean I would clean the top of my kitchen cabinets with the bleach too, because my cats loved to nest up there! Just would keep the cats away until it dried).

I know how you feel, the potential for ringworm freaked me out after I read online the horrors, but for me it didn't go that far. I think because I keep a pretty tidy house already I didn't have a lot of dust and things for the spores to attach to, and that may have been my saving grace! I made a ringworm checklist, I will see if I can find it in my notes! I would do certain task every few days and broke them up so I wasn't constantly cleaning, this got me through. Also, I wouldn't let the cats into bedrooms or certain rooms to keep myself from having to clean it regularly for ringworm (I called it the ringworm free zone!). Containing it probably is a good idea if you find out it is ringworm. Eventually after they showed no more signs of ringworm I got lax on the cleaning and fingers crossed... everything seems fine to this day! Good news, my cats never really seemed too bothered by it all, just would whine when I would clean their spots (my vet told me to clean with antibacterial soap, then put a layer of anti fungal cream like athletes foot cream, along with some oral medication, I believe it's the same you mentioned).

Keep me posted, and if it ends up being the dreaded ringworm I will definitely pull my notes I kept during that time for my cleaning regime!

 

[Zizi0202]

No problem! I didn't have hardwoods at the time, just tile/laminate the bleach did fine. But because of my past experience with ringworm and my fear of it just being anywhere when I moved into my new place (just a couple months ago) with hardwoods I got a steam mop, and I read that the heat from those can kill off the spores, so I did a big cleaning just to be safe before the cats moved in! I didn't get rid of any of my furniture or bedding, I just made sure to clean everything thoroughly pretty often (used a steam cleaner for my fabric furniture and carpet) and then once I got a good clean of it I just wrapped places like the couch/chair (places the cats would spend time) with cheap white sheets and would clean those regularly. I still have that furniture to this day and I haven't had a re-occurrence of ringworm in almost 3 years (will be 3 this summer).

I also have the same vacuum, I have a pretty nice shark one and didn't want to have to trash it! I just took it apart and soaked the filters and attachments in bleach and would clean the canister in bleach. I think some people say buy a really cheap one that you can trash later, but I didn't find the need for it. Haven't tried the foot spray but makes sense! It is an anti fungal but not sure about how it will be around cats. I didn't really use anything else special besides lysol and bleach on hard surfaces I had (I mean I would clean the top of my kitchen cabinets with the bleach too, because my cats loved to nest up there! Just would keep the cats away until it dried).

I know how you feel, the potential for ringworm freaked me out after I read online the horrors, but for me it didn't go that far. I think because I keep a pretty tidy house already I didn't have a lot of dust and things for the spores to attach to, and that may have been my saving grace! I made a ringworm checklist, I will see if I can find it in my notes! I would do certain task every few days and broke them up so I wasn't constantly cleaning, this got me through. Also, I wouldn't let the cats into bedrooms or certain rooms to keep myself from having to clean it regularly for ringworm (I called it the ringworm free zone!). Containing it probably is a good idea if you find out it is ringworm. Eventually after they showed no more signs of ringworm I got lax on the cleaning and fingers crossed... everything seems fine to this day! Good news, my cats never really seemed too bothered by it all, just would whine when I would clean their spots (my vet told me to clean with antibacterial soap, then put a layer of anti fungal cream like athletes foot cream, along with some oral medication, I believe it's the same you mentioned).

Keep me posted, and if it ends up being the dreaded ringworm I will definitely pull my notes I kept during that time for my cleaning regime!

Congrats on three years ringworm free! This makes me feel so much better! Our home is already relatively tidy I suppose I just got freaked out about the fabric/carpeting but I’ll invest in a steamer just in case. Do you remember which steam cleaner you purchased?

Thanks for the tip about bleaching the vacuum I’m going to do that now while I wait for the million loads of laundry I put to finish for now I’m also going to whip up a batch of the 1:10 bleach and water solution. My cat also loves sleeping on top of the kitchen cabinets! It’s his favorite spot and I want to make sure I really hit hard on all of his nesting spots. For now we have both of them confined to the kitchen/living room area which are their favorite spots.

I’ll check with the vet about the foot spray and then update here in case others might find it useful as well.

I love the idea of a ringworm checklist. After reading the article about the housecleaning regime for ringworm on the forum I was about to start crying haha. Breaking up the tasks into a daily checklist seems like a great idea for such a daunting task. Thanks for sharing again!

 

[hiya_unicorns]

My mom actually had a bissell Steam cleaner, i think it was the Pro Heat, looked sorta like a bigger vacuum and had some attachments for furniture. Worked pretty well!

 

[Amrito]

View attachment 285808 View attachment 285809 View attachment 285810 View attachment 285811 View attachment 285812 View attachment 285808 View attachment 285812 View attachment 285809 View attachment 285812 View attachment 285809 View attachment 285808 View attachment 285809 View attachment 285810 View attachment 285811 View attachment 285812 Hi everyone! I am a long time lurker on TCS and have never had a reason or issue to post about until now...after reading so many of your horror stories and comments about ringworm, I am ready to start pulling my hair out!!

I have a 1.5 yo male DSH, who DH rescued from the streets of Brooklyn when he was barely a few weeks old and his mother had been killed. We immediately took him to the vet for a comprehensive exam and subsequently gave him all his shots and dewormed him.

His health has always been excellent without fail until recently. I took him to the vet for his annual shots and things didn’t go well. He was so scared and they had to hold him down very aggressively on the table to give him the rabies vaccine. He was pissed off, but calmed down when we got home and things seemed fine.

A few days later I noticed a patch of hair missing from between his shoulder blades and the area was red and inflamed. He started itching and there was a LOT of dandruff and skin flakes. Per the vet it was likely mechanical injury where they had held him down by the scruff of his neck. They told me to wait it out. A few days later I noticed the spot was getting bigger and there was a new spot as well. I decided to go for a second opinion.

The new vet also thought it was a mechanical injury from them holding him down by the scruff. More time went on and another spot popped up. We went back to the second vet. She checked for ringworm with the Woods light and nothing showed up. She decided to take a culture, which eventually came back negative. she also considered the possibility of food allergies.

Woods light and culture were both negative for ringworm. She gave me topical miconazole which didn’t help. Then we tried oral itraconazole which was compounded by a pharmacy...

The spots cleared up and hair grew back!! However after three weeks of giving the oral meds, I got extremely busy this last week and stopped giving to him on a regular basis. He has been itching a lot and now he has a new spot between his shoulder blades. I feel absolutely terrible for not finishing the full month dose that the vet gave me. Our second cat has shown no symptoms as of yet and the two share spaces throughout the house.

My question is, is it likely to be ringworm since the itraconazole helped? Is it common for the culture to come back negative? Now I’m not sure how to judge progress since the culture is already negative...

Also read online that some staph infections can look like ringworm. But would Itraconazole help the spots clear up if it were a staph infection?

Any advice would be appreciated and I have attached a picture of the spots as well. Am praying it might be a bacterial infection rather than ringworm after reading what others on the forum have gone through.

Hi there,

I've treated my cat for ringworms. Very says she's clean. Still, she's got patches that glow under the UV. Vet says it's dry skin. I'm not sure I'm buying that. Any ideas?

Thanks