3/30 Jenks AMBG 54 No Shot +3 52 +6 66 PMPS 117 +7 73 +10 75

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AZJenks

AZJenks

Member Since 2014
3/29

It happened again last night. Same time, same symptoms. A good hour of barfing until the only stuff coming out is yellowish foam and restlessly trying to do a bowel movement when all there is is a watery, mucousy stool. So he didn't eat at the overnight feeding, and was uninterested in morning food or even gravy. With a 54, there was no chance we were giving insulin.

He's quieted down now. There hasn't been an episode for almost 6 hours, so whatever it was that was irritating him must be gone. But for the life of me, I can't figure out what the culprit is. Last night's food was completely different from the night it happened last. He hasn't been into anything he shouldn't have. And none of the civvies are all fine despite the same diet.

My best guess from online research seems to indicate that it is gastroenteritis. If it is, I'm almost certain the vet is going to try to give him metronizadole, which Jenks hates, so are there any less offensive alternatives that won't make him run away foaming at the mouth?

I'm not sure we'll get in on such short notice, so we may be monitoring him again and hopefully get an early Saturday morning appointment.

But if it's anything like the last incident, he'll be fine by the evening. Poor guy.
 
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Jenks is at least out and drinking water now. That's a good sign.

We also managed to get an appointment for 4:45pm today, so hopefully we can get a leg up on whatever this is. Maybe we can do his annual diabetes checkup and script renewal at the same time to spare us the stress of an additional visit. That would be nice.
 
You might want to get a GI blood panel done. It would check for pancreatitis and his B12 levels. If B12 is low due to poor absorption in the gut, supplementation can help. A senior panel bloodwork, if it's been a while, might be a good idea too.

Have you been giving liquid or pill metronizadole? I could hide the pill form in pill pockets, but even the chicken flavoured liquid got a run away. Of the pill can go in an empty gel cap and. Et tossed down. A coating of butter helps it slide down.

Sending vines for Jenks. :bighug:
 
Thanks @Wendy&Neko. I'm not hopeful about getting anything other than a basic pre-surgical blood panel from this place. Every time I bring up the possibility of a senior IDEXX panel, I get met with mostly blank stares or indifference.

He's only had metronizadole once, in January of 2014 when we were just starting out. It was the liquid. And it was metronizadole flavored. I just remember it as a generally horrible experience that didn't resolve the problem at the time. Assuming it's prescribed again, and this time in a pill form, where does one get empty gel caps on short notice?
 
You can buy gel caps on line, capsuline or Amazon are options. I managed to get some quick at my local compounding pharmacy. Maybe a local health food store, though they might not have the smaller ones. Or the vet. Try for #4 size. I think that might fit the metro which is a pretty small pill. Numbers 3 and 5 also work for cats, larger number means smaller gel cap. Since Neko was an acro with some soft tissue growth in the throat, I tried to stay away from the number 3's.

Liver flavoured metro didn't work here either. I think the med just has such a strong taste.
 
My civie was on the pill for several months, and just wrapping it in a piece of pill pocket worked. I had tried the liver flavoured liquid on him with a no-go. He was on a lower dose, so a higher dose pill may be bigger.
 
I hope the vetty visit goes well and you can get something to help Jenks get over whatever this is. Sending prayers.
 
Jenks turned in another unbelievable performance for a no shot cycle. I don't know how he's managing to maintain such wonderful numbers under the circumstances, but I'm so thankful that he is doing it.

We made it to the vet today and it went as expected. The doctor mentioned that this sort of thing can be difficult to pin down, so it could be this, it could be that, let's try this for now, so on and so forth. Also as predicted, there's a bottle of metronizadole sitting in the fridge awaiting the first dose. I'm not looking forward to the next five days of that. On the upside, the doctor recommended a blood panel to check pancreas enzymes, and I was surprised to learn it was an IDEXX test. No more blank stares! So we'll have a full complement of tests in that assay, even if it really wasn't in the finances to order. Oh well. Jenks has never had anything but a basic blood panel, so I'll be interested to see the results of this comprehensive test.

Jenks weighed in at 26 pounds, which is three pounds less than his annual checkup this time last year. Great news!

Also good news, his appetite is back tonight. He ate well and got a shot, so fingers crossed!

Here's a picture of Jenks in his favorite spot at the vet, on the scale. He fell asleep on it right after this:

nktEA8.jpg


@Love-Paula aka Woodsywife - Maybe I was posting from the future ;)
 
First dose of metronizadole in and it's just as unpleasant as I remember. Poor Jenks is running around the house slobbering looking at me like, "Why are you poisoning me?"

He gets 2ml a dose. I know I got the first milliliter in without a problem. The second one was less successful. I honestly don't know how much I got in versus how much he might've spit out.

He won't be so easy to fool the next nine times. Not looking forward to it.

Why do they insist on giving cats something that tastes so horrible that they recoil at the mere sight of it????
 
I'm glad Jenks got his appy back and lost some weight. I hope you get good test results back. I hate that they give you meds that make them slobber like that. Poor Jenks.
 
Fell asleep? At the vets? OMG - how lucky are you - lol. :joyful:

I hope that the tummy continues settled and he is feeling better. Are you giving any SEB? Could he be eating a lizard? I still have to watch out for that with Gizmo. The gecko's get in and he will chase them down and eat them if I don't catch him first.
 
@LizzieInTexas - Yeah. He exhausts himself yowling on the drive over and then he's ready for a nap in the quiet of the office. He gets in that scale, puts his head down, and it's off to dream land for him. I seriously consider getting one for the house as a cat bed for him.

I'm currently not giving him any supplementation for the stomach issue. I actually had to do a search for SEB to figure out what it was :joyful: Good suggestions on eating something foreign, but Jenks has near zero hunting instinct, so I think it's safe to say he's not chasing anything down. I don't even think he'd know what to do with a lizard. He'd probably just look at it while it walked by. It could probably even sit on him and he wouldn't do anything :joyful:

Hopefully all we have to do is just wait it out until it, whatever it is, runs its course.
 
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