Sick Kitten...

[Bunderella]

I adopted a special needs kitten from my local shelter on may 31st.
We immediately left the shelter and went to the vet due to her having a cold. She weighed in at 1.74lbs. She was put on clavamox 2x daily at 1ml each dose. After the full dosage of antibiotics i returned her to the vet, as she still had severe congestion, thick green mucus, and sneezing. He the proceeded to give her the first shot in her kitten series, dewormed her, and put her on clindamycin 2x daily at .5ml per dose. He failed to report her weight to me at this time. She was also tested for feli feline leukemia and was negative.
Fast forward a week to this past Monday and i weighed her on my kitchen scale i use for my animals and she weighed in at 1.85lbs.
She was failing to gain weight, and still sickly. She has been on clindamycin for a week now, and is experiencing some improvement in her congestion and mucous, but is now sleeping more frequently, running a low grade fever and has diarrhea.

I have been giving her water, her medication and feeding her her regular food along with some of the meat baby food. She weighed in this morning at 1.9lbs. She has also been on L-Lysine powder once daily since the day we got her.

She plays, eats, drinks, purrs... i am just worried that my vet has missed somthing amd that the symptoms we are now having arent just side effects. I have drained my savings on her medical bills and am unable to take her to my regular vet for a second opinion at this time.

Has anyone experienced side effects in kittens on clindamycin? Am i overly worried?

I just want my baby girl Darwin to be healthy and happy.

 

[StefanZ]

I dont have medical opinions for the moment, but I do have a couple of home care suggestions.
If you can get raw goats milk, this may make a plus here, as in many other situations. Canned is OK to use, but not the same potential plusses.
Raw honey, organic style (ie unpasterized honey from a small producer) contains too some antiviral and antibacterial properties. You can have a little in her drinking water.

As she has diarrhea - may be caused by the antibiotics - she needs pedialyte or other rehydration formula. If you buy, let it be clear flavorless pedialyte for human babies. You can dilute it some.
IF you make a home made pedialyte, you use this mentioned honey as source of glucose sugar.

BeneBac probiotic, made by PetAg, is good, should help too against antibiotic caused diarrhea. Otherwise, you can try with some mild full fat youghurt. Prferably with acidofilus and dofilus bacteria added, if you can find such a one.

 

[talkingpeanut]

In which way is she special needs?

 

[catlover73]

A bad URI can be a pain to get rid of. My now 12 year old Starbuck had a bad URI, eat mites and an ear infection when she was a kitten. She had to be treated with 2 different antibiotics, 2 different ear washes and drops for the infection. She also had to endure having the ear mites cleaned out by the vet multiple times before they cleared up. Starbuck decided to let me know she had a URI by waking me up and sneezing snot in my face for 15 minutes on Christmas Eve. She was taken to a vet as soon as I could find one that was open that morning. Hubby got woken up by me at 7:00am telling him Starbuck has to go the vet now. He was half asleep and did not wake up right away until she got right in his face and started sneezing on him too. He woke up very quickly then.

One thing that really helped with the congestion from her URI was steam treatments. Have you tried this yet? Run the showers in your bathroom as hot as possible to steam up the room. Sit in the steamy bathroom with Darwin for 15-20 minutes 2-3x a day.

I actually brought her with me to my parents house on Christmas day just so I could keep up with the steam treatments. My parent's adult cat was scared of her and would not go near her. My parents thought she was adorable even though she was sneezing on all of us. My parents wanted her to be comfortable and actually put a pillow on the floor near the fire place for her to have somewhere cozy to take a nap in their house. She fell asleep on that pillow right before we sat down to eat. My mom had us take the warmed pillow home with us. We put it in her carrier on the car ride back. For the trip to my parents house we warmed a towel up in the dryer to put in her carrier. We were going to warm the towel up again for the ride home but she decided she wanted to stay asleep on the pillow when it was time to go home.

 

[Bunderella]

Thank you so much for for the replies!

Yes she is getting steam treatments. Before i could get pedialyte and yogurt for her she got a fever that spiked higher than i was comfortable with, she ended up lethargic and with tremors from it. Called my vet and she is being seen again (by my regular vet for the first time) at 12.45 today. I also keep her warm, and she soends 90% of her day sleeping on my chest or in my bra.

As for special needs, she has a tail deformity, it only raises so high, is short and the tip is crooked like a shepherd's hook. I adopted her sick because i fell in love. So i guess i asked for this..
She was also said to have some mental delays but we haven't had that addressed yet due to her being so sick.

I just adore black cats, and cats who are "special"... I couldnt not take her in.
After looking over her paperwork i noticed she was born 4/28/18, and i took her home on may 31 so her age i believe plays a big part in this.

 

[catlover73]

I am glad you are able to get her back into the vet today. I hope Darwin feels better soon. Please let us know what the vet says.

 

[Bunderella]

Will do! Heading there now.

 

[catlover73]

How is your baby doing?

 

[Bunderella]

We went to a new vet, my preferred vet actually and found out a few things...

First she was on way too high a dose of clindamycin which was causing the fever spikes and diarrhea. Dr. A dropped her dose down from .5ml 2x a day to .3ml 1x a day. The clindamycin is working and she is not nearly as snotty and congested as she was so we will be continuing this course of antibiotics. She also prescribed her .1ml 2x daily of a medicine i forget the name of to help with her diarrhea. We are doing a fecal sample as well.

Saturday night she was so hot and so lethargic she could barely open her eyes. Tonight she is alert, bouncing around playing, meowing with sound and being a normal silly kitten. ♡ hopefully this puts us on the mend!

 

[Bunderella]

Darwin. ♡

 

[catsknowme]

Darwin is a real cutie I hope and pray that she continues to improve. I would love to see her little tail. Bless you for adopting her

 

[Bunderella]

I have tried and tried to get a picture ofnit but her being black and so small ita never clear. As soon as i get one I'll post it!

 

[catlover73]

I am glad you saw a different vet that fixed the medicine dosage for the antibiotic and is treating the poop issue. Darwin is adorable and I hope she feels better soon. Hopefully you can continue to use the vet you saw today in the future. I am glad to hear Darwin back to acting like a normal active kitten.

 

[Bunderella]

The vet we saw saturday is my normal vet, and she will be seeing her from now on. The only reason she saw the oroginal.vet was he was contracted to do her shots, worming, and spay through the shelter i adopted her from.