Vet suspects my cat small intestinal disease

[RobC]

Hi everyone,

I have posted on here a few times before about my cat. The vet is now leaning towards my cat having small intestinal disease. He is losing weight and he eats like a machine. Sadly there is no weight on his stomach, you can see his hip bones stick way out. It is really sad to see. She recently prescribed him prednisolone and I have been giving him that. His weight remains steady at like 7.7lbs but it seems he is just gaining weight in the front half of his body. The back half is so skinny.

The vet thinks it may be inflammatory bowel disease as the small intestinal disease leads to malabsorption and weight loss. Unfortunately my cat would not eat the food that goes with the hypoallergenic diet (which could possibly reduce the inflammation in the GI tract so they gain weight). So now he is on prednisolone and I am really scared because he is just so skinny in his stomach and back legs.

Is anyone else going through this? Are there any other things that people have tried and it worked?

 

[LTS3]

Here are two good web sites with info on treating IBD:

IBDKitties – Helping Save Lives…One Paw at a Time

www.ibdkitties.net

Feline IBD - Healing can happen!

Address the root cause of IBD in your cat. Treat inflammation and gut dysbiosis with proper tools to restore health, not just manage symptoms.

www.rawfeedingforibdcats.org

Treatment generally consists of diet and medications. A bland-ish novel protein diet is helpful. You don't need the prescription food the vet recommends. There are many suitable commercial limited ingredient brands you can feed:

100% Rendered Free Cat Food | RAWZ
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
Grain Free Wet Recipes - NutriSource Pet Foods (not exactly an LID food but some of the canned are novel protein)

Raw and home cooked diets are also options. My IBD cat eats a commercial brand of raw cat food.

Many IBD cats have low B12 levels which affects nutrient absorption and results in weight loss. The vet can check B12 levels with a blood test. You can give injections of B12 at home.

Steroids can cause any cat to be ravenous. Just feed plenty of food without causing too much of a weight gain.

 

[daftcat75]

Does he vomit or have loose stools? These are both common to IBD. If he doesn't have either gut or butt symptoms but he eats and eats and loses weight, that points more towards small cell lymphoma. It can also be hyperthyroidism and probably a couple other things. Has he had an ultrasound and blood tests? The blood tests will rule out those other things. The ultrasound can confirm either/or (but not which) of IBD or lymphoma. Your cat sounds like a poor candidate for the surgical biopsy to determine which one it is. Instead, I would recommend giving the prednisilone a chance with whatever food he'll eat--assuming he doesn't have gut or butt symptoms. If he does, then you need to figure out which foods stop the loose poops and/or barfing. If the pred plus a non-reactive diet (and B-12 shots!) doesn't put weight back on him, then you might consider that it's lymphoma and discuss adding chemotherapy to his medicine. This isn't as scary as it sounds for cats. Most cats experience mild if any side effects. My Krista was just a bit sleepier on dosing days. No big deal. She slept it off and was back to "normal" later that night. If he's not getting B-12 shots, discuss that with your vet too. These are very important in malabsorption diseases as the gut isn't absorbing B-12 like it should.

 

[RobC]

Thanks for the replies. My cat has been on Hills, Royal Canin, Purina Pro Vet, Natural Balance and wouldn't eat those foods. I am looking for other alternatives today. The problem is he isn't really a chewer, he is more of a licker. He seems to lick the friskies pate food and gets that in, so I guess I am looking for another type of pate or a puree. We tried the pate and a puree version of the food above but he would not eat. This is so frustrating because he is not gaining weight in his lower half.

 

[daftcat75]

When was the last time he had his teeth checked? Sometimes abnormal eating and texture preferences in cats is due to oral/dental pain.