Monday, September 1, 2014

Feeding a Sick Cat That Won't Eat

From July 9 Facebook post about trying to get Cooper to eat when he wasn't eating:

Has anyone fed sweetened condensed milk to a cat reluctant to eat or that needed nutritional support? I gave some to Cooper and he liked it. (DO NOT feed sweetened condensed milk or any form of milk to kittens under the age of about six months at all and never to kittens to replace a missing nursing mother or aid the nursing mother. Use kitten formula KMR from pet stores. Milk products might be tolerated by those six months and older but only if they need nutritional support. A cat of a year or older shouldn't have milk on a regular basis due to stomach/diarrhea issues.) The math: one serving is 2 tablespoons. In 2tb are 110 calories, 55 mg of sodium, about 140mg of potassium, 20g of sugar, and some iron, calcium, and vitamins-if I calculated correctly. I mixed 1tb scm with 2tb of water. So, per 3ml syringe serving, the amounts above are greatly reduced if 3ml is one serving. If your cat isn't diabetic, and doesn't need to avoid the sugar for any other reason, it's a good energy source. Sodium might be a bit much but it comes out to 7mg in a 3ml serving (the syringe size we use.) There are six calories in a 3ml syringe. We are counting every calories Cooper is eating. Since his kidney values are now high, we tried reducing the Torsemide and found we could not. He needed extra and it came out to 2.5 QID regardless. He was fine before he went to the vet Saturday for a blood draw and once we found his values were high, and we reduced his Torsemide, he began to stop eating as much and then wouldn't eat on Monday. We had to cut back the Torsemide but again, later, had to give more. Tuesday he got the appetite stimulant Mirtazapine which helped. He's eating small amounts but is not ravenous. His breathing rate was up this morning to 12 and then 10 after his 7:30 Torsemide dose. It was still 10 at 11:30 so I moved up his lunch med to that time and gave him 2.5 and not 1.25 Torsemide. He was breathing well at 8 by 2 p.m. I created a chart to track fluids we give by mouth, calories given, calories eaten. Daily goal is 90 cals a meal. Yesterday, he ate a total of 135 calories by the end of the day. Today, after lunch, he's about 135 calories, slight improvement. He's not drinking enough on his own so our goal is 72ml of fluids by mouth to support his kidneys. And that is water, club soda, KMR, sweetened condensed milk, and sweet potato liquid baby food that is included in the total. We are surprised and perplexed by the sudden increase in kidney values and sudden decrease in eating. He was fine until Monday. But that is how it goes, says the vet. One day the cat is fine, with 69% of kidney function lost but no outward sign of it and then the next day the cat hits the 70% loss and then all manner of issues and symptoms appear.

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