Cat with eating, drinking and other issues - help!

[Maul]

The background story for our friend Jin-ho can be found here: http://www.animalrescuekorea.org/forums/showthread.php?t=4234
I wanted to start this new discussion because I'm afraid that the title of the old one might not help people finding the topic. And trust me, I really need help with this one.

Anyway, since the last post on the other topic, we got Jin-ho back from the hospital with medicine for 14 days. No special diet, quite surprisingly. When me and Jin-ho got back home, he immediately started walking around and meowing quite fiercely, but I was happy to see that he was active and seemed to remember the place and didn't just hide under the sofa. He also remembered me and was happy everytime I petted him or just gave him attention. No aggressive or overly cautious behavior.

Then started what I was afraid of: running to the toilet. Fortunately this time he could pee, but I wasn't too happy to see that he still felt the need to go to the potty over and over again, to urinate small amounts.
Also my other worry came true: he refused to eat or drink. The eating thing is a huge problem because if he doesn't eat, I can't get him to take his medicine. The girl in the vet's (I strongly doubt she was a doctor or even an animal nurse after hearing her comments) said I can try to just put the medicine into his mouth, and I wanted to laugh at her face. I mean, I have had quite a lot of experience in trying to get cats to take their medicine, and the only successful way so far has been inside food, preferrably a treat. But if Jin-ho doesn't eat, how can I get him to take his medicine? Is there a successful way to make a cat without appetite to eat? We tried with different kinds of foods (wet, dry and even fish!), but so far I've seen him eat a bit maybe three times - and that was before we took him to the vet.

Also him not drinking is a big problem, because it can make him sick again. We have tried with water in many places, water inside food (of course he doesn't eat, so...), water left over from boiling the fish, but nothing works so far. I haven't seen him drink even once. :(

And one more thing to make matters worse: he seems to have bad nocturnal habits. Last night he kept me and my roommate awake all night with meowing and running to the toilet (where he would throw the cat litter around like a maniac). Finally, when I got up to see what he was doing at around 4 am, he stopped immediately and started purring with happiness. So seems he is just really dependent on attention. But come on, in the middle of the night... How can you deal with something like that?

Actually, I don't know how to deal with any of these problems. I've lived most of my life with cats around me, but never had these problems. My cats always ate and drank water, so I didn't have to worry about such trivial-seeming matters. Of course they sometimes kept me up at nights, but mostly when they were small and full of energy. Jin-ho is plumpy, so why doesn't he suddenly want to eat anymore? He is clearly over 5 years old, so why does he want us to pet and play with him in the middle of the night? This morning I was so tired and hopeless I just wanted to cry, and he hasn't even been back 24 hours yet!

I'm sad to say I didn't get such good instructions when we were leaving the vet, because there was only this girl and she seemed completely clueless about animals. The dialogue was something like this: So, there's gonna be a special diet for Jin-ho, like Dr. Choi said? -No, the medicine is enough (and yes, she checked from the papers). So, how do I feed him the medicine? -He likes you, so maybe he'll just let you put it into his mouth. So, what if he won't drink? -Put some water in his food. Argh! The girl was also really afraid of Jin-ho, which I concidered weird because he's probably the kindest cat I ever met.
To be completely honest, most of the time he is really cute and lovely and has such good and friendly manners, but he is going to stress me and my roommate to an early grave if he keeps on going like this. I hope he just needs adjustment, but if he doesn't start eating, drinking and taking his medicine, what can we do?

[annie]

Hi there,

First of all, sorry things are not too smooth, but thanks for giving JinHo a chance.

When one of my foster cats was letting herself die, I took wet (canned) food and would "just" put some on my finger and force it into her mouth (by prying her mouth open with my other hand). You could put the medicine (in powder) in there and use a syringe without a needle.

But honestly, I think JinHo is just a bit shocked and needs a bit of time. It's only been a short time since coming back and could explain the meowing in the middle of the night. Another of my foster cats would meow like crazy for attention until she understood everything was fine and we were not abandoning her or anything.

Was there any improvement today?

[Maul]

Hi,

thanks for the tips. Actually we tried to force-feed him, but it didn't work out. We also (as a desperate measure) tried to put some food on him to see, if he would lick it out, but he didn't. In the end, however, it seemed that it was just that food with the strong smell of medicine that he didn't want to eat because after a few tries he ate some other food we gave him.

It seems that things are starting to work out, but of course it's too early to say for sure.Yesterday night and this morning we were able to feed him his medicine with food. :) I don't know why he earlier refused to eat the food that had the medicine with it. Or any food that we tried, actually. I also got us a syringe, but luckily we didn't need to use it yet.

He's also peeing quite a lot now, probably thanks to the medicine. He still keeps on running to the toilet often and just peeing small amounts, but since he's peeing everytime he goes there, I'm not complaining so far. He hasn't pooped even once since coming back, but hopefully he will get around to it eventually. If he keeps having his appetite, he's bound to.

And this morning I saw him drink water for the first time! He had opened his dry food bag last night and eaten some of it (clever cat :D), so probably he was thirsty because of that. We try to keep him a bit hungry now so he would eat the food with the medicine on it, but seems he found a way to eat anyway. :D

Last night was also a bit better with the meowing and the toilet, or maybe I was just too tired to even hear it anymore.

I hope he will keep progressing like he has so far. He's really come a long way in a short time and I'm happy for him and in a way also proud of him. He's also getting more and more relaxed, which is important so he can fully recover. I still have to praise him for being such a nice and kind cat, not even hissing, growling or trying to bite or scratch when we had to force the medicine in his mouth. He is still a bit wary, but loves attention and petting. I'm sure he can be happy with us, or if we can't keep him, in a loving home.

[LolaMarigolda]

It isn't impossible to pill a cat without a pill syringe (though one makes it much easier). THIS (http://www.marvistavet.com/html/pilling_a_cat.html) explains it (and has some helpful pics). I've done this many times without getting bit.

Did they tell you what type of stones (calcium oxalate, struvite) JinHo has? There are some OTC supplements for the one (struvite), but they won't work on the other. If it is struvite, the supplement in combination with sub-Q liquids can bust them up/assist in getting them passed. Then continuing the supplement can keep them from reoccurring (since it seems that once they start, it becomes a reoccurring issue.

[Maul]

Hi,

and thanks for the answer. I have to say, I've never seen a successful pill feeding for a cat, everytime I've tried or have seen somebody else try they just spit it away. That link seems helpful, but also not probably possible to do with all cats...

Anyway, so far we didn't need try the syringe and also feeding the medicine we tried only once. That time we opened the capsule and tried to put just the powder in, but he had a bad reaction to it: immediately after getting a bit of medicine in his mouth he started vomiting saliva, and in the end I don't think he swallowed any of the medicine... So I'm not so optimistic with the syringe or forcing the pill in his mouth, he would probably just vomit everything out.

But luckily for us we found a way to feed him his medicine inside the food, but it's tricky business. First we have to mix the wet food into reeeeally small pieces, but just a drop of water, the medicine and a bit more of water and mix like hell. If even one of the steps goes wrong, he won't eat the food.

As for other news, he's still peeing well and now he also did number two once, so also that problem is cleared. :) Today he has been a bit down, just lying under my bed. His moods change really fast and I don't really know him well enough to read him at all (also there's the fact that we didn't yet have any chance to see him in a normal situation, so we don't even know what he is really like). Yesterday night went superwell, no running to the toilet at all, and he's really been enjoying the quality time sessions with us, but today it's apparently one of those days... Well, we'll just keep trying with him and hope he will have more of those good days.

And no, the doctor didn't tell what type of stones he had. Like I said, I didn't really get almost any info when picking Jin-ho up, because there was only this girl, who was quite clueless about everything... Of course I would have wanted to talk to Dr. Choi, but he wasn't available. :( We did get to consult Dr. Choi once when going to see Jin-ho in the hospital, but that time we just got the general update on the situation, and probably the plan was to tell us in more detail when we would pick Jin-ho up.

[LolaMarigolda]

Are you in Gangnam or Haebangchon? I'd be willing to show you how it is done; like I said, I've done it too many times to count and haven't had a problem with them spitting it out or throwing it back up.

[Maul]

Hi,

we're in Haebangchon, just had to take Jin-ho to vet in Gangnam. So far he's been still eating the medicine with food, so we didn't need to force the pills down his throat, but I'm not counting on the good luck to keep on going. He's been less and less happy to eat the food with the medicine, so I might be interested in learning how to do it, if I can't do it by myself and in case we need to start giving him the medicine the hard way..

[LolaMarigolda]

Let me know if you need a hands on lesson. I live in Hannam.

[Maul]

Thanks. I will. :)

[Maul]

This morning I was going to come here and tell the world how the pill feeding technique actually works like a miracle on cats! I tried it this morning with Jin-ho because now he has apparently reached the point where he won't anymore eat the food with the medicine. The trick worked like a wonder and it seemed the cat didn't even notice that he swallowed the pill.

But now I tried again. And failed. Badly. I took Jin-ho close to me like in the morning, put the pill in his mouth, but he wouldn't swallow it. So I did like they say in the instructions, gave him some water so he would start swallowing. But no. He kept the awful-tasting pill in his mouth and started drooling again really badly. I kept him for a moment, but had to let him go. And of course he spat the half-melted pill on the floor. I tried again, but ended up having my arms up until my elbows in his saliva and medicine. In the end I guess he had maybe 1/3 of the medicine and was really shocked afterwards, even though I tried to be gentle... He wasn't aggressive or anything, he just didn't swallow the medicine even when I tried to put it deeper in his mouth. And I really started to feel sorry for the poor guy, he was crying in such a heartaching way.

So... I'm officially running out of methods to feed the medicine. There's still the syringe, but I don't even need to try to know it's gonna end up in drooling and vomiting. It seems the medicine's smell and taste is just too much to handle, because now he's really getting strong reactions against it. And there's still another week of it left.

Tomorrow morning I probably just have to hold the poor boy until the medicine dissolves in his mouth. That's gonna be ugly. :(

[aescobedo]

Use the pill gun, it works. Just shove that baby down its throat and push the button. Its called a pill gun or a pill syringe. I worked in a all cat research facility and this was the golden standard. We pilled like 200 cats a day sometimes. You just gotta be kinda aggressive with it.