Questions About Feline Allergies

[ColoradoCat]

Hello, everyone.

One of my sweet girls, Cassiopeia, has been scratching herself to the point of bleeding. About 2-2.5 months ago, our vet tested her for things like mites, bacterial infection, and ringworm and determined that it's most likely an allergy. I had her on steroids for a couple of weeks, and that seemed to clear the whole thing up. She seemed to be doing find until relatively recently, but unfortunately she's started scratching again and now has an open sore of about 0.25 inches near her shoulder blades. I've been in contact with the vet again and we're going to look into trying a hypoallergenic food (which I'm not looking forward to because she's picky) as well as taking her to a dermatologist for intradermal skin testing. Does anyone else have any experience with feline allergies of this variety? What might she be allergic to? Is it more likely to be a food allergy, or something environmental?

 

[Koolkat13]

Hi there.
I had a very, very sensitive kitty that passed away a few years ago. Because of him & his various, chronic health issues I began my 10 year journey of researching feline nutrition. You're off to a great start with the skin contact allergy testing. I know vet visits can be very hard on both cat & human. Unfortunately, vets do not have a good handle on what is appropriate for cats to eat.
My baby, Alexander, would fixate on a spot on his left arm. He would lick & chew until he was raw & bleeding. It hurt me to see him hurt himself. I eventually made him a little sleeve to cover that arm so it would have a chance to heal. I can't seem to track down any photos of his poor scabby arm, but I will attach one of him with his little custom sleeve. (He looked really cute in it).
We went through rounds of Prednisolone, and like your cat, it would work wonders. He would stop scratching, licking, overgrooming & obsessing. Then, sure enough, a week or so off the steroids & it would all start up again.
Trust me, I know the nightmare of changing a cat's diet. I'm currently in the process of weaning my little ones off of Fancy Feast. They ignore the healthy food, literally pretend it doesn't exist, & proceed to beg & tell me they are staaaaaarving... It's hard, but we must be strong for their own good.
Before you take on any more expensive tests, I recommend eliminating ingredients from Cassiopeia's diet. Corn, wheat, soy, oats & gluten are the big ones. If you want to look into proper cat nutrition a little more on your own, catinfo.org is a fantastic site. They are not sponsored. They're not selling anything. It is just scientifically researched facts.
It took about a year for me to get Alexander on a wholesome grain-free wet food diet, and his skin issues cleared up 100%. His fur was softer, fluffier, he shed far less & was healthier overall.
Weirdly enough, my current cat Kazie, gets seasonal allergies & he picks at that exact same spot right between his shoulder blades! (Pic #4 - Kazie's bald spot). He has to wear his donut collar in the months of March & November. (Pics #5 & 6).
In order to help Cassiopeia heal, you may want to check out a harness that covers the spot between her shoulder blades or a donut collar.
You can determine if she has seasonal allergies by keeping a calendar of her symptoms. If she's like Kazie, you'll be able to narrow it down to spring or fall & then just treat her symptoms at those times. Even if that ends up being the case, getting those grains & carbs out of her diet will improve her health in every way.
You're at that point where it's going to take a lot of time, observation, plus trial & error to see what improves her condition. You seem like a great cat mom. I think you'll figure it out.
Hope I didn't overwhelm you. I'll get notifications for this post if you have any more questions.
Good luck!

 

[mrsgreenjeens]

It's really hard to track down exactly what causes this incessant itching/scratching without starting to eliminate things. As you are already thinking, it could be food, or it could be environmental. For food, as mentioned above, if you can cut out those specific items, that should help immensely. If it's environmental, then you need to be a sleuth and look around your house to see if you have things that might be scented, including your laundry products, AND her litter. But it might indeed be seasonal allergies just like people get, and it's possible that even human allergy medication could work. It has worked for certain cats. I'm talking things like Zyrtec, Claritin, Benedryl. BUT, I certainly would not give any of those without speaking to your Vet first.

 

[ColoradoCat]

Thanks, everyone, for the suggestions. I've switched out our laundry detergent to see if that might be the cause, but I suspect it will take some time before I see any results. I managed to get an appointment next Tuesday for the intradermal testing, so I'm probably going to do that first and then go from there. I've also noticed that she's been sneezing just a little bit, so I'm pretty sure it's an environmental allergy of some sort, but we'll find out soon enough.
Aside from the allergies, she's doing very well. She loves to play with and groom her sister, and she remains the snuggly, cuddly love-muffin that she's always been (at least since I un-feraled her), so the good news is that she doesn't seem to be in too much discomfort. I will update as soon as I know more.

 

[ColoradoCat]

So an update about Miss Cassbo. I was able to get her to a veterinary dermatologist and they said that, given the fact that it seemed to happen in fall/spring as well as the fact that she responded well to the prednisolone, she almost certainly has environmental allergies. She was given a non-steroid medication that I am now giving to her daily and we have a followup appointment in May to see how she's reacting. If we need to, we'll also do allergy testing on top of everything, but she's doing much better now.

 

[fionasmom]

Hopefully this will help; please keep us posted as to how this works out for Cassbo.