Permanent diarrhoea in DCat- please help

[HeyThereDelila]

Hello,

I’m desperate for help for my 13 year old girl. She’s developed diarrhoea which nothing seems to shift. She’s on steroids to try and improve symptoms and vidalta for her overactive thyroid, had blood tests and an abdominal scan which showed nothing concerning. No kidney issues we’re aware of.

There’s often blood in her stool plus she’s being sick a lot and bringing up a lot of fur balls.

We tried hypo allergenic food and hypo allergenic biscuit. She takes her pills in treats so I need to get some hypo allergenic ones; does anyone know of any good brands?

We change the litter every other day but she’s still going to the loo where she shouldn’t, in other parts of the house, and she has access to the garden. We have a 6 year old DS and a baby on the way, so really need to see if we can try anything else as the situation isn’t hygienic or sustainable.

I’m desperate not to have to rehome her or PTS. I doubt anyone would take her because of her condition and the local shelter is full.

If anyone has experience of this or knows of hypo allergenic treats for us to try along with food I’d be so grateful. Thank you.

Oh, absolutely she’s also really hungry and thirsty all the time!

Has she been tested for diabetes? How does her fur and skin look? I only ask because we had a cat years ago who was diabetic with similar symptoms.

Sounds as though something significant is going on for her - possibly related to her thyroid or soomething else that it may be possible you never work out what it is. I would worry that she’s in pain and/or distress. It can be very hard to tell this in cats as they’re so good at masking. If you’ve run through all the options with your vet then I’m not sure anything else will work and the situation is unlikely to change. It doesn’t sound as though her hyperthryoidism is well managed if she’s hungry and thirst all the time. I’m expecting she’ll be very thin as well. She doesn’t sound well at all. When did you last go back to the vets and discuss how ill she is? I’m sorry but I don’t think sourcing hypoallergenic food and treats is going to resolve this. I think it’s possible PTS would be the kindest option for her although that’s a conversation for you and your vet.

If there's blood in her poo then she needs to see a vet asap.

EDIT - you cannot rehome a desperately ill cat. You either look after her under a vet's supervision or you pts. And she does sound very ill.

If you have the funds it is worth speaking to Vince the Vet., he offers alternative treatments, both by his website but also consultations. He has worked wonders with the dogs of two of my friends and we use his bladder supplements for our boys who get stress cystitis and it has completely cleared it up

This may sound silly but try a dose of Panacur. This cured a very ill cat for us after vets could not come up with anything.

I can't work out how to share a thread. You need to read this thread

Depending on your purse/insurance etc, you may need to think about a referral to the Royal Veterinary College. I went through a journey last year with Tobias having permanent diarrhoea and us trying to find out the cause. We tried many different types of foods, various blood tests (that's when we found he has FIV), and an ultrasound scan.

The scan showed thickening of the wall of the descending colon, but they couldn't tell how far it went or take a decent sample as it started just before the pelvis got in the way of the scan. The next step would be surgery to sample it, but with an FIV cat (ultra risky for any surgery) who is terrified of everyone except me and DSis (who stuffs him with cooked chicken whenever she's round) and stresses at the best of times, we agreed with the vet it wasn't worth it.

I've copied & pasted here the suggestions she got from the RVC for him (none of which are feasible due to him sharing his food with Girlcat, and them both being fussy buggers).

For inflammatory gastrointestinal diseases we would try to resolve these with diet alone if possible. For cats with primary large intestinal presentations we may either use high fibre diets like Biome or a hydrolysed diet, while for small intestinal diarrhoea would use hydrolysed diets or novel protein diets. For this cat, I think trialling a hydrolysed diet would be where I would start.

Here's a little more info on hydrolysed diets.... And how to do a food trial! The article mentions dogs / food allergies but the principles are the same.

How to do an elimination diet food trial for dogs | FirstVet

There are only a couple of hydrolysed diets on the market: Purina HA, Royal Canin Anallergenic, and Hills z/d.

The golden rule is... Just the food and water during the diet trial proper, otherwise it's a waste of your money and time!

Thank you so much everyone for your time and advice, I really appreciate it. Sorry for the late reply; we’ve been away for a few days.

Will definitely try the hydrolysed diet if we can - thank you! My problem is that she needs pills, and won’t take them in food or let me open her mouth, so I have to stick them in treats. I’ve bought some Scumbles (sp?) ones which claim to be hypoallergenic, so let’s see if that plus food and biscuit helps.

To be clear, there’s no question of rehoming her. It would break my heart and she’d end up living in a cage as nobody would take her when she’s so ill.

We were at the vets with her in Feb, will rebook depending on what happens on this diet.

I worry too about her masking pain, and I don’t want her suffering. We’ve been repeatedly told by vets that some blood in stool is “normal” in some stressed cats, but I remain unconvinced.

Will keep trying, but equally we won’t let her suffer if she is failing.

She did lose loads of weight and is thin, but has regained some now she’s on steroids.

We’ll also ask the vet about diabetes - thank you!

If you haven’t been to the vet since February then I would definitely book in asap for a reevaluation on how’s she’s doing. All the best.

Did you read the thread I mentioned? (If someone can actually link that would be great). Honestly, try Royal Canin hairball for a few days.

You need to see the vet today.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/the_litter_tray/5207258-ive-discovered-a-miracle-cure-for-chronic-cat-diarrhoea

The cat sounds seriously ill and it hasn’t seen a vet since February ? How many litter trays do you have as if she has diarrhoea you need a few as she may not want to use it after she’s used it once so you either need to be checking them regularly or having a few .