Feline asthma

[qwom]

Had anyone had any experience with their cats suffering from asthma? One of my boys might be suffering - under investigation by the vet at the mo

[TattyCatty]

Yes, our old boy had asthma. It was diagnosed pretty quickly by our vet, after we took him in thinking that he had a furball issue. He was prescribed an inhaler, which we gave him via a "spacer", similar to the sort that children use.
I take no credit for managing to get him to use it. The day after he was diagnosed, we were going on holiday, so dropped him off at the cattery with the inhaler! The fabulous cat whisperer type owner trained him to tolerate it, with lots of treats. He was as good as gold with it, and we just gave it to him whenever we saw him having an attack.

[qwom]

Thanks for replying :-) my boy had become pretty sick quite quickly. He's improving after having steroid jabs and no masses are present on his chest xray. I'm hoping it turns out to be asthma as it seems to be easily managed. The vet talked about managing it with steroid tablets. Do you just have an inhaler?

[TattyCatty]

Yes, just the inhaler, which we used for quite a few years. He's not with us any longer sadly, but the asthma quickly stabilised once we had the inhaler to use. Hope your boy is on the mend soon!

[qwom]

Thank you for sharing your experience. I hope he will too. He's so perky and bright despite struggling with his breath. He's definitely still full of life!

[Toddlerteaplease]

What symptoms does he have? One of mine coughs and sounds very wheezy. But is absolutely fine within a couple of minutes. Seems like she is trying to cough up a furball but never does. Usually does it about once a day.

[qwom]

That sounds like feline asthma - you should get her checked at the vets

[Toddlerteaplease]

I mention it everytime we go to the vets. She's even done it in front of a vet but they are not concerned. As it usually only happens about once a day. She doesn't have a heart murmur so it's not heart related. I suspect it may be related to the shape of her face as it's very flat. She had surgery to widen her nose and it's helped loads. She copes with the coughing fits far better than before.