Any helpful tips for IBD?

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AmyB

AmyB

Member Since 2019
Hi there! It's been a while since I've been on here since Salem has been OTJ for a while, but I'm about at my wit's end when it comes to his IBD. The vet I was seeing diagnosed him with it due to a thickened intestinal wall and his main symptoms are recurring bouts of nausea and vomiting. And I mean vomiting as in he starts and won't stop for a long period and it's hard for me to get him to eat. Went to see a new vet and she did bloodwork which came back as normal, but now she wants to do more tests which I'm all for but I can't afford the $1,000 price tag.

So my question is, does anyone have advice for diet/probiotics/any way I can try to manage this more on my own? I've tried giving him different proteins and he was doing good on turkey for a while but the last few months he's been going downhill. It just seems like there's not a lot people know about IBD and the vets around here are less than helpful. Any advice is appreciated, especially foods to try. He's a bit of a picky eater and I can't get him to eat a lot of the more "healthy" stuff.
 
Disclaimer - I am very new to this group.

My cat Simon also has IBD with associated vomiting. He was started on the steroid Budesonide in January. We had a suspicion he was pre-diabetic (he had one random high blood sugar in the preceding two years), so my vet selected it, as it is supposed to have a more localized effect (eg not like a more systemic steroids like prednisolone or prednisone that gets absorbed through the body), and thus hopefully wouldn't cause his blood sugars to go up.

The good news is that it really helped with his IBD and once he was titrated up to the full dose of it, his vomiting stopped and he was clearly feeling better.

The bad news is that even though it is supposed to not be absorbed systemically, it was just enough to tip him over the edge and it has now made him overtly diabetic. So we are now struggling to manage this, and get his insulin regimen sorted out. My vet was quite surprised that it has such a significant effect in increasing his blood sugars as it really isn't supposed to (apparently Simon didn't read that book!). So just wanted to mention that this is a possibility, should this medication be started in your cat.

His Budesonide was stopped once the diabetes was diagnosed. Unfortunately his vomiting returned just one week after it was stopped.
We still need to come up with some other type of treatment modality for his IBD now. Vet is contemplating chorambucil now but there are some concerns with that one for him.

It may be that we have to restart the Budesonide, and manage the effects of it, on his blood sugars, with insulin.

And Simon too is SUPER picky about what he will or won't eat. He is super fussy and absolutely refuses to eat people food, raw food, unique protein sources, or almost every single type of canned cat food. He'd rather starve, and has tried to do so at times... :(
It is incredibly frustrating, so I totally feel your pain!
 
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Have you tried Slippery Elm Bark Powder?
There is a FB group called IBD Kitties which is very good with lots of information. . There is also a Fb page for IBD cats called Raw feeding for IBD cats.
Have you tried novel proteins?
SBoulardii probiotic is also very good.
 
Hi there, the groups and sites that Bron and Marina gave you are really great resources for IBD kitty caregivers. My cat has suspected IBD/SCL and suffers from occasional vomiting and nausea and chronic constipation. Bron mentioned slippery elm that is a natural remedy for nausea. Making a ball with slippery elm bark powder with aloe juice and swiping it into my Ruby's mouth before eating helps with nausea. There's a bit on this page on how to do it: https://www.rawfeedingforibdcats.or...es-slippery-elm-bark-powder-instructions.html

Switching from canned/pouch commercial food to a raw diet has helped Ruby's vomiting and nausea, but I get that it might not be for every cat or caregiver. Have you tried ruling out proteins? Poultry, fish, and beef are often triggers for kitties with sensitive systems, so maybe switching to a novel protein like bison, venison, or rabbit for a while could help. There are also lots of freeze dried raw kibble options out there if your cats prefer crunchy food, like from Vital Essentials.

Recently I started Ruby on a course of digestive enzymes and pre/probiotics: Adored Beast Healthy Gut twice a day in her food along with a half capsule of Visbiome probiotic. This combination is very popular among members of the Raw Feeding for IBD Kitties Facebook group. Neither are the cheapest options but I hope not to have to keep her on either of them for very long. Another option is a fecal transplant pill from AnimalBiome, but this is expensive and in my mind, a kind of last resort.
 
Hi everyone and thanks for your comments. I've had Salem on budesonide, but at this point it's not really working and he's still getting sick even when he's on it. I want to try feeding him novel proteins but he's so picky it's pretty much impossible to get him to eat it. I'm just worried that it's something more serious than just IBD but I don't have the money right now to get more tests run to figure it out. I'm going to try a different diet/probiotic combo to see if that helps at all. Right now though he's so sick I can't get him to eat anything so I guess it's back to the vet in the morning for more medication...
 
Hi Amy, I’m sorry Salem isn’t well. :bighug: I’m in the same boat as you. Ruby has had some abnormal ultrasounds but I can’t afford to do a biopsy at the moment, hence the diet change to raw, the supplements, the slippery elm. I hope to be able to do it in the future before going down the budesonide/chlorambucil road, but for now she seems to be doing ok. I’m also armed with Ondansetron, Cerenia, and appetite stimulants but haven’t had to use them too much thankfully. I hope you can figure it out. :bighug:
 
So I got a rabbit food that he seemed to like, but his stomach is too upset right now for him to keep anything down. I'm taking him tomorrow to get a Cerenia shot and see what the vet says but then I'm going to try just doing rabbit for a while and see if that helps. Budesonide usually helps him so I don't know why it's suddenly not working at all. Maybe someday I will be able to switch him to a raw diet but I truly don't have the time/money for it right now. I just find myself frustrated bc I spend all this money at the vet and I still can't get any solid answers.
 
AmyB said:
So I got a rabbit food that he seemed to like, but his stomach is too upset right now for him to keep anything down. I'm taking him tomorrow to get a Cerenia shot and see what the vet says but then I'm going to try just doing rabbit for a while and see if that helps. Budesonide usually helps him so I don't know why it's suddenly not working at all. Maybe someday I will be able to switch him to a raw diet but I truly don't have the time/money for it right now. I just find myself frustrated bc I spend all this money at the vet and I still can't get any solid answers.
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I understand your frustration. Sometimes I wish they could just tell us what's going on. Hope the vet can get to the bottom of it. I was really surprised at how well the slippery elm worked if you haven't tried that with aloe as a remedy for nausea.
 
Maybe ask for a fPL snap test must to rule out pancreatitis. If it is that that is stopping him eating he will need some antinausea meds and pain meds and maybe some subQFluids to help him through it.
 
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