Please help:cat needs to take her meds

[Uberella]

My cat had a nasty fall from height 8 days ago;she has been quite seriously ill from complications from this and has arrived home tonight after her second three day stay in that time at our veterinary hospital.

she has to take 4 tablets twice a day;they are high dose steroids and a anti biotic;the steroids are extremely important as she developed a huge mass of inflammation in her stomach from physical trauma from the fall.

The vets told us they put the tablets in her kibble and she ate them while there but she’s refusing to eat for us;her evening kibble with the medication in remains untouched,we’ve mashed up some corned beef and crumbled the tablets in to tempt her and prior to this we managed to get one steroid into her by wrapping her in a towel but she was screeching and then pooped herself and it was too distressing for her and tbh seeing so distressed made me cry too.

I’m absolutely desperate to get the meds into her as she’ll decline without them and I can’t afford another vet stay;her treatments have nearly maxed out the limit of the insurance claim (£4600)-the limit is £5000

Please if anyone has any advice to get her meds into her then im willing to try it.

from a very worried cat owner

Crush them up and put them in lick e lix

Can see you've ordered the pill putty type treats, we've had success with that in the past. Also found any kind of fish helpful, tuna seemed a good shout. As others have said, do ask your vet what can come in liquid format if you are finding tablets difficult.

Deeply embedded in a small softened cube of cheddar is worth a try. I think it masks the smell of tablets which they can sense at 100 paces.

The pill pockets arrived at lunchtime and I used them to get her morning dose of medicine down here;she wolfed them down;I think she liked the way they smelled and tasted.

I’ll be using them to do her evening medicine although I’ll be doing them as late as possible because of her delayed dose earlier

Honestly thank you all for your kind words and suggestions

Pill pockets sound great! Glad they’ve worked for you OP.

For the future, our vet will do a long-lasting steroid injection to avoid us having to get pills into our incredibly resistant cat. Might be worth asking x

Aw I'm so sorry about your poor cat OP! Mine is the same with pills and the forcing her to eat them method does not work. I've had success in the past with Laxacat paste- squeezing some out onto my finger and then putting the pill in the middle of the paste. Obviously you can't use too much as it has a laxative effect but small amounts are fine. Tiny pills she will accept mushed into some cheese but bigger ones I've had to use the paste.

I've since discovered dissolving or grinding down the pill and then swishing into a small amount of water and mixing with her wet food has better results. But I suppose the success of that depends on the greediness of the cat! I really hope she is better soon xx

Ah sorry just seen you've got them down with pill pockets- fab! I'll have to check them out myself x

Genius!

I bought a packet of cheap frozen (cooked) prawns. I get three out every evening for our pill hating Tortie - once defrosted (about 12 mins) she has one as her ‘starter’, one with her pill in and one for ‘pudding’.

@Uberella I’m so happy that the pill pockets worked for you 🤗
Fingers crossed for a speedy recovery.

Try tomato ketchup.

How was the process to get the allergy diagnosis?
We suspect little master might have an allergy, but the vet told us that the test is just really expensive and quite often non conclusive, so they wouldn't advise it :/

So sorry to hear about your poorly cat.
Have you tried a pill popper? It was the only thing that worked in the long run when my cat was on long-term medication for hyperthyroidism.

Aw bless, it's so hard. I've tried lots of different things with our cats and dogs and the only thing that has worked is crushing them up and mixing into a pate/squirty cream! So, anything wet and tasty all mushed in together.

We didn’t do the full allergy testing so we don’t know exactly everything that might be causing it (DCat has had problems with skin itching and overgrooming, so is on a low dose steroid plus hydrolysed anallergenic food for allergies — the proteins are broken down until they are too small to trigger an allergy). Whenever she’s eaten any normal food or treats she gets itchy again, so we can’t quite tell exactly what proteins she’s allergic to as the vet says most pet food and treats have a mix of different animal proteins in them.

We do know that at least one of things DCat is allergic to is fish, because she used to love tuna and at one point we gave her some when she’d been on the allergy food for a while and within a few days she had sore itchy bits all over, poor thing! But it could be other things as well. You can do an exclusion diet to see what it could be, but they have to be on exclusively the anallergic diet for about 6-8 weeks each time before you try each individual food, so it’s a long hit and miss process!

Cats are notoriously bad at taking tablets.
We went through this last year. It’s a worry. I don’t know how large your tablets are but could you try:

1. Vet. She was able to hinge the mouth and literally lob the tablets in. No payment. One minute of work. Try asking/begging especially if you have spent such a lot already with that vet.
2. lick e lix - deluge the tablets in this
3. Tear off a little of a soft treat like a Webbox stick. Embed the tablet in the end of it. Tear off a little more and cover the tablet completely.

hope something works X

OK - my cat was having none of the tricks mentioned above so I just had to learn how to do this. We ended up with DD and I having a routine which worked.

You will need a pill popper and a towel.

Person one holds the swaddled cat and the bottom of the jaw, putting their finger on the shorter teeth right at the front.

Person 2 has the pill popper and opens the mouth and fires with the pill popper. It goes far further back than you think. You are basically depositing it at the tonsils without hitting the back of the throat.

I just got tablets in my cats my mushing some Stilton round the tablets. You can get special empty pocket dreamies now especially for cat tablets.

I use two methods - take a small slice of ham, glue the pill in the middle with a dab of mayo then fold the sides up over into a little parcel. Make another parcel without a pill and give that one first, then give the pill bomb. Mine gobble it down.

Second method is a bit of extra mature cheddar - soften it between your fingers til it’s like plasticine and pop the pill in the middle completely coated with the cheese. As before, make a second one minus pill and give that one first. Mine gobble down cheese and actively hunt for any missed scraps.

I don’t like to crush pills - some must be given whole anyway, and you can’t be sure how much got ingested in a paste smeared on paws. If they spit out a whole pill, it’s easy to see, and then leave it a while and try the other method using the same spat out pill.

I had to have my finger amputated 3 weeks ago as my cat bit me when giving her meds.
She will take them now out of the lic e tube things.
Please be careful I didnt realise how serious a cat bite could be.

One of my previous cats found tuna absolutely irresistible. Perfect hiding place for his tablets and it worked 😁

Wrap her in a towel, open her mouth put the tablet into the back of her throat and blow on her face. That makes a cat swallow. Check she hasn’t spat it out. I hope she recovers soon.

I have 2 cats, they can spot any tablet disguised in anything. They love lickelix but if I even think about crushing anything at all in it, they look at me very disappointingly and walk away from the lickelix. My vet suggested something called churu rolls. Omg they loved it and their tablet for ticks and worms gone in seconds.

Grr pets and tablets is a nigtmare mix -you can buy/borrow a plastic pill thing like a syringe (obvs without the needle!) and you put the pill in the tube and literally push it in their throat so they swallow it. It can be very traumatic for all involved but has to be done somehow.. I advise you wear thick gloves when doing it and have a helper if possible.

Webbox Lik-e-Lix !!! Crush tablet,then squeeze all the filling out of the tube and mix. Chicken flavour is a good choice. Catnip flavour if you can get it. I got mine from Amazon. Gentle strokes and chin rubs for your kitty x