IBD cat refusing medication in all forms

[TuftedLadyGrotto]

One of our cats was diagnosed in the autumn with Inflammatory bowel disease. Vet thought it might be cancer, but she responded to medication and was doing really well.

To start with she had both medicines by injection every other day (steroid and anti-sickness). Then we moved onto tablets. These could be crushed and put in food- mackerel or something stinky and tasty. She's always loved food and gobbled it down. We were able to reduce the dose.

Then in the last week or so she has begun to leave some of the food, the refuse it all together. So I started moulding it into cheese (it's a tiny tablet) and ham and she gobbled that. But she's stopped doing that. I tried the mackerel again tonight and she just sniffed it.

She's lost weight again. Obviously we're taking her back to the vets, but not sure what else we can try. We can't afford the injections long term, it is £120 a week (not covered on insurance) and she is a very timid, was semi feral and it too traumatic for her to be held down everyday to give. (we tried this, she just hides permanently and won't eat or drink).

Bumping incase someone can help.

Sorry to hear about your issues

Any progress? Understand how weekly injections maybe too stressful for semi feral cat.

There is a pill syringe you can get that holds the tablet and you dispense it to the back of the throat - much easier than holding mouth open with one hand and trying to get the tablet in that way.
Or ..... get a 5 or 10ml syringe from your vet, crush the tablet and mix with 5ml of water and again, back of the throat.
If giving the tablet whole, always try and hold mouth closed and rub her throat until you've felt her swallow at least twice xx
Give either of those a try and persevere.
Good luck xxxx

PS I forgot to say, make sure she's only refusing food etc because of the tablets and not because she's actually getting poorly again xx

I use a pill syringe for my girls heart meds. It's really easy. Although she is very docile!

We have a pill syringe, but it still takes two of us to hold her down. And usually a few attempts.

I think she is poorly again and she just isn't eating at all :(

We have an appointment with the vet tomorrow. We are going away this weekend for Dh's 40th birthday.

I think it's a vicious cycle, in that the less medicine she has the worse she is and the less she eats

She will eat a few dreamies, but nothing else :(

She might be cooking up a crisis, unfortunately. We have the fun of bouts of pancreatitis with our IBD cat - she just stops eating.

They’re all different so it’s hard to suggest something. Ours turned a corner after years of being very sick and cycling from crisis to crisis when we changed her food to high-quality, all-meat, and started a daily antihistamine (she had an allergic element too.)

Before that miraculous recovery, we’d got to a point where crises could be managed at home with sub-Q fluids, and painkiller/anti-sickness shots once or twice a month. We’d managed to dial right back on the steroids. This had been a cat who was getting regularly hospitalised until then.

She’s 11 now.

Thanks. She's 12. All the cats have high quality meat content wet food- Carny. She used to gobble it down.

She just refused some cheese. She's never been a fussy eater, she loves food. She's been found stealing and eating potatoes (mashed her fav), pasta, baked beans as well as normal cat stuff.

Whenever any of mine need tablets, I use the weebox sticks, they make great pill pockets. Push the tablet into a small piece of stick and then mush it with another small piece to make sure it doesn’t fall out either end.

Hope she gets better.

Sorry if your cat is poorly again TuftedLadyGrotto

This is a bit of a weird one, but I've had many cats over the years, all different temperaments, some semi-feral. I've always been able to get tablets down them, either with my hands or with a pill syringe, except for one cat - Sam. Not a feral cat, just Lord and Master of the household. He was IMPOSSIBLE to handle.

When he needed a long course of tablets once, I tried putting the tablet in all sorts of food, but he was so cunning he would always sniff it out and refuse to touch it. Then, for some unremembered reason, I tried sprinkling a bit of savoury yeast on a small piece of meat with the tablet inside. He gobbled it down! I would even sprinkle a small amount on his food to tempt him to eat. There was something about the yeasty smell that really appealed to him.

I think savoury yeast is the same as nutrional yeast. Might be worth a try - as long as someone doesn't come along and say it's dangerous for cats!

I am incredibly lucky that fatty is so good with her pills. If she wasn't i don't think she'd still be here's

Vet here. Sorry to hear this! Cats are notoriously difficult to tablet. You’ve probably
tried dreamies to hide tablets in? Has anyone demonstrated to you how to safely and effectively
tablet your cat? If not perhaps ask at your next vet appt? Perhaps approach one of the nurses as they often have a bit more hands on practical advice to give?

Your cat might have had this checked by your vet but have they measured something called TLI/FOLATE AND COBALAMIN? Cobalamin in Vitb12 and can be given every 4 weeks by injection and is relatively cheap. Long acting steroid (Depo-medrone?) would also be a possibility? Has she had her thyroid status checked as this can often give symptoms of IBD which to diagnose accurately your little cat would need a full thickness bowel biopsy. Otherwise IBS is diagnosed on basis of excluding other illness (as above) or monitoring response to steroid.

So sorry you’re going through this. Feel free to PM me if I can help any more.

Also C225 really good suggestion with 5ml syringe but 5ml water is far too much to safely expect a cat to swallow. You risk aspiration and distress to the cat. Try 1ml water maximum and please make sure the tablet is a) crushable (so not inactivated by crushing as some tablets have a coating to get the active ingredient past the acidic stomach conditions and to the part of the bowel where they can be absorbed or act if they’re acting on the bowel itself)
b) not inactivated by water (some
antibiotics are known for this)
Sorry just had to say otherwise you might be putting in all this effort and your cat might not be benefiting at all!

I was also going to suggest seeing if one of the vet nurses could help you find a way to tablet her. Unfortunately they don't realise the tablets will help them.
Our old cat had IBD (amongst various other things) so we put her on hypoallergenic food some of which were better than others for her.
What Skandi said about the vit B12 Objective. Our girl was deficient and the injections did help.

Skandinaviem thanks for the advice - I always check with vet before giving to my cats in that way to make sure it is able to be crushed etc
I never had a problem with 4/5ml of water and was always told by vet that amount, but i usually used around 3 as my old boy had to have daily meds and was horrendous so the quicker we got it done the better
Really hour your cat is feeling better soon OP XXX

She has an infection. High temp. Could be hepatitis or something with the gall bladder. She's had fluids and antibiotics and got to call the vet tomorrow to see how she is. Then blood tests.

If it's gall bladder then it is long term antibiotics. We've been told to stop with steroids for now (they contravene)

Vet is amazing. Yes @Skandinaviem it is an assumption because biopsy was considered too dangerous. Because she responded so well to steroids it was assumed IBD.

She has radioactive iodine treatment for thyroid, she's had everything this cat!

We have given tablets to other cats long term. We are definitely trying the correct methods. I have even been trained to give injections from when that was needed, to avoid unnecessary vet trips and costs. It was the vet that recommended grinding into food, so I know that is ok.

Sorry also possible kidney and liver failure. The blood test will show that. Of its that, then we probably have to make difficult decisions.

The way we give tablets is spend at least 30mins tracking down cat and trapping a room with no unreachable spaces. Attempt to hold cat and wrap in towel. This can take a few attempts and usually involves scuffing her.

Pin between knees legs securely and hold towel around neck to prevent escaping paws. Dh then opens her mouth by pressing at back of jaw, tips her head back and inserts with pill syringe. Then gold mouth closed and stroke throat. These last few stages usually involve some serious buckaroo on her part, biting when opening the mouth and and moving head rapidly from side to side, spitting tablet out.

You might have tried it but have you tried webbox licks?

My little girl has just started steroids (after a 5 night stay in the hospital as she was so ill she nearly died) for ibd plus she has hyperthyroidism so it's minimum 5 tablets at the moment.

Vet has said I can crush the steroids then I can mix them in the lick. Or in water in a syringe.

Iv had some luck with tinned ham cut the smallest square (so it's just a small mouthful for the cat) you can that will hold the tablet without splitting and it's just chance if your cat is well enough to eat it.
Tinned ham is disgusting but it's worth it if helps.

She isn't much better this morning. Still not eating, she's very frail. We can't decide what to do for the best.

If we have the blood test, whatever it shows will require long term treatment. Possibly it will mean something with little positive outlook.

We cannot afford expensive treatment. We are not irresponsible owners, she has had £2k of radioactive treatment and we've treated her for the IBD (even when one vet said it was probably cancers and we should prepare for worse.

We put ourselves in debt over the injection treatment and other IBD costs from November to March. It was costing £120 a week. We have no more money :(

But I am heartbroken at the idea we would give up on her for money. There is just no more.

Would she tolerate injections better than tablets. Would you and your vet be happy with you doing them at home? If you’re taught. Hope she improves

We were doing them at home. That was costing us £120 a week for just the medication. And no she doesn't take to it well as we have to catch her, hold her down and inject her. She then hides for two days u til we catch her again for the injections.

Sorry to hear she isn't better this morning.

In terms of giving tablets, if they are crushable, I would second the Ginkypig's suggestion of Lick-e-Lix. Our cats would take any tablets if I crushed them between two teaspoons and mixed them into a Lick-e-lix on a saucer, even if they were ill and not interested in other foods. I stuck with the chicken and salmon flavours, as the cream/yoghurt one gave them the runs.

I'm really sorry to hear that. Whatever happens you did your best, we can see that from what you've told us and how you talk about her.

I'm on the absolute cusp of this too. So far after hours and hours of trying over the whole day every Iv managed to get her to take them its mostly just been luck but obviously because she had been in the hospital for 5 nights I got her back having had a full 5 days of meds and having been on fluids etc under her belt but she is regressing in the two weeks she's been home despite having only missed 2 steroid tablets over that whole time. Her weight has dropped again to 2.9.

If we (you and I) can't medicate (in a way that doesn't ruin what time they have left) then they will become ill much sicker than they are now very fast and we will lose them anyway.
Part of our responsibility is to look at the bigger picture and make the choices that don't let her suffer and if that means putting them to sleep we will do that because we love them and love them too deeply too allow the end of their life to be undignified or painful.

You need to be REALLY confident and REALLY firm with her. If you wrap the towel/cat burrito tight enough she shouldn't be able to move or hurt herself. Try and hold her head still to avoid the thrashing. In my experience animals never get better at this kind of thing but owners definitely can! My last cat had to take 6 tablets at various times of day and at first it was a 2 man job with literal blood, sweat and tears for 30 minutes but by the end I was able to do it alone in 2 minutes before work. You're doing your best. Just keep going.