? Orbax problems?

[Squeakycats]

Hello! My kitty has an infection in one of his toes. This happened once before, and his vet gave him amoxicillin; it cleared up the infection but gave him diarrhea the whole time he was on it. This time, he was given Orbax oral suspension. I was suspicious when I saw that it had a "malt flavoring," but I figured we'd give it a try. I gave the first dose last night, and this morning his numbers were much higher--he had been at around 275 for a few days (probably elevated a bit because of the infection) but was at 380 this morning. The other new med he was given is Onsior, an NSAID (supposed to be safe for cats), to help with the inflammation and pain in his foot--but it's a tablet, so I'm a lot less suspicious of it.

I don't know what to do about the Orbax. I would hate to take him to an emergency vet just for this issue, but my vet's office isn't open until Monday. I'm thinking my choices are either to skip the antibiotic until Monday--which I hate to do given how fast infections can get out of control in diabetics--or give the next two doses and also increase his insulin. I don't have a written prescription (it was filled in the office), so I'm assuming a people pharmacy couldn't switch it to tablets for us, if they even have pet meds on hand.

Has anybody else had this situation? Anybody have any recommendations?

 

[Bama Kitty Mom (GA)]

Sorry no one has responded. According to Drugs.com Orbax oral suspension "is a malt flavored antibiotic suspension containing 30 mg/mL of orbifloxacin and sorbic acid as a preservative." No mention of sugar that I could find. Bama was prescribed Orbax several years ago by his then vet for a respiratory infection. This was after he had developed diabetes and his vet was always observant of his diabetes when treating him. I would have continued with the medicine despite the higher BG levels since the infection itself could be the cause rather than the Orbax. FWIW Bama loved the taste of it. So far, it's been the only oral medication I didn't have to fight to get him to take.

 

[Squeakycats]

Thank you! I'm still suspicious that it's the Orbax that's increasing his levels--he had the infection prior to the meds, but his numbers only shot up after the first dose. He doesn't seem to mind the taste, and I did decide to go ahead with it and just increase his insulin dose by about half a unit, which seems to be working ok. I'm waiting to hear back from the vet. I saw the same ingredient list you did and then dug around a little more trying to find out what the malt flavoring itself is, and something I saw (can't remember where) said it was actual malt--a mix of wheat flour and malted barley, with "maltitol" listed as an ingredient. I would think vets would be aware of it if it was a problem, so maybe there's really only a tiny bit of the malt/flavoring and that's not the problem for this poor kitty, who is just kind of a mess right now. He doesn't seem to be feeling much better yet, though the foot looks a bit less swollen, so we may be moving on to another antibiotic anyway. Sigh. I'm glad to hear Bama doesn't object to malt; I agree that it's delicious! Love his cute facial markings!

 

[Squeakycats]

Random update: the vet actually called the manufacturer, and they said that the Orbax liquid does indeed contain malt, and thus a little sugar--but they don't think it should be enough to be a problem. I'm doing ok controlling Misha's blood sugar by just raising his dose .5 units, and his foot appears to be healing, so I think we'll continue with it!