Took Nishi to the vet, now she's mad and I have to figure out how to medicate her

bluebklyn

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Nishi has been having diarrhea the past week, so we saw the vet today. They did all the things. They took blood, urine, and stool samples. They cleaned out her ears and did a culture. They gave her sub-q fluids because she was dehydrated. It turns out she has an ear infection, so now I have to clean her ears every other day for a couple of weeks and put drops in her ears twice a day. They also gave me Proviable paste for three days, capsules for two weeks, and metronidazole for two weeks.

This cat does not like to be medicated!!! I'll take any advice you have on that, but mostly I just wanted to commiserate with anyone whose cat baby is resistant to medication. We will survive, but ack. :oops:
 

mrsgreenjeens

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Did you ask your Vet if you could get these medication compounded into another form, like either injectables or transdermal gels? Metronidazole is very bitter tasting, so it's hard to hide it in food. You could put it in an empty pill capsule, IF you can pill him, but if he's hart to pill, I would think a capsule wouldn't be easy.

I did recently see this video which might work for you, and maybe you can combine all the medications together and give at one time as they can be given together.

How We Give Our Pill Hating Cat A Pill
 

LTS3

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Pilling tips:

Pilling Cats: Must-know Tips For Hiding Pills – Cat Articles
The Best Pill-taking Secret I Know...
Pilling Cats and Dogs Safely
How We Give Our Pill Hating Cat A Pill
Getting Cat To Take Pills... Post Tips Here.

Are the capsules the kind that can be pulled apart? If they are, you can try opening one and sprinkling the contents into canned food with extra toppers added. If the capsules are not the pull apart type, use Pill Pockets or one of the other suggestions in the link above.

Is the metronidazole (Flgayl) liquid or a pill? Either is extremely yucky tasting to cats. I think a pill might go down a little easier if a Pill Pocket or something is used :think:

Proviable is just a probiotic. If you can't get your cat to lick it up, you can use any other probiotic. There are pet ones you can buy or you can buy a low CFU count Human probiotic. Open the capsule and sprinkle the contents into canned food. Cats won't notice it.

Try warming the bottle of ear drops in your hand for a few minutes. Warm drops might startle the cat less than cold or room temperature drops.
 
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bluebklyn

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I didn't even think to ask about compounding, so everything is separate in its original form and taste.

The proviable is going okay. The paste isn't her favorite, but she does lick it up eventually if I put it on her food. And she's had the powder (capsules) before and it fine with that.

The metronidazole is a liquid and honestly, even though Nishi thinks SHE IS DYING, using a syringe for that is probably easier than trying to get a pill down her throat. The towel burrito method didn't work very well last night, but it was slightly better today. I got the metronidazole and ear drops where they were supposed to go.

Good news, though. All her tests came back normal, including blood tests, so we are going to go ahead with this round of meds and watch her for future signs of IBD.
 
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