Cat keeps throwing up, seems to have lost weight

I boarded my cat at the vet starting last Tuesday and picked him up yesterday (Monday) morning. Today he's been throwing up and can't seem to keep his food down.

Ever since being diagnosed my previously little fatty (16lbs) has been pretty skinny, bony at times (between 10 and 11.9 lbs). He had started putting some weight back on but before having him boarded I got him checked up because he seemed skinnier, he had lost almost 1/2 a pound (11.2lbs). I noticed last night that he felt bonier than normal. I called the vet this afternoon about the potential weight loss while he was there as well as the puking and they said he had been eating fine and seemed happy while he was there and to give him 24 hours since he's already had so much disruption the last few days.

I'm not concerned about the vet because they're a cat only facility with a nice boarding area and a friend has boarded her cats there for years with no issues so I don't think they're lying about anything.

I feed my cat BFF brand wet food - I've seen people say this food isn't the best because it's tuna based which can lead to mercury poisoning. I've tried feeding my cat Wellness, EVO, Purina DM, and Fancy Feast wet foods but BFF is the only brand he'll eat. I've been feeding him the BFF for a little over a month which seems quick to me for mercury poisoning but I really don't know how that works.

After my former vet raised the insulin dose too much and caused my little guy to have two hypo seizures I switched to this vet almost a month ago and we've been trying to re-figure out his insulin dosage. We started at PZI 0.5 units 2x a day and are now up to 1.5 units 2x a day (the previous vet had him at 5 units 2x a day!) His blood glucose tends to be in the 300s so we're still in the adjusting period.

I'm going to stay in touch with the vet but in the meantime I have no idea where this puking and weight loss is coming from, the spreadsheet is up to date so if anyone has had this problem or can glean anything from his spreadsheet I would be forever grateful!!

 

I'm sorry your little man is not feeling well. I'm just going on my own experience here but my thought is he could be having a pancreatitis attack right now. He may not have pancreatitis normally, but diabetes means his pancreas does not work as well as it should, it's not producing insulin as normal. A cat having a pancreatitis attack does have trouble keeping food down.

Stress from being boarded, even if the facility is wonderful could still be a factor. He was away from home and that's stressful.

Regarding the weight loss, the BFF is lower in fat than other foods. That could be part of the problem.

An unregulated diabetic kitty will also have weight loss issues. Once he starts getting better regulated he should be able to put some weight back on.

Don't wait too long if he continues to vomit, he could quickly become dehydrated. Ask your vet about giving him something to stop the vomitting if he's not keeping anything down. If he also is not keeping water down I'd want to check for an obstruction also. A fur ball could cause a block or even something as silly as eating a bug can do it. One of my own kitties needed surgery to remove a beetle she ate.

 

I would get some ketone test strips and check for ketones, if you haven't already done so. If the vomiting continues, it could be an obstruction like Tuckers Mom said, too, and you would want to get that checked out by your vet. One member's cat ate some dental floss once, and she was throwing up and had to have it surgically removed.

 

Hi!
Darn! So rough on your guy. My extra sweet 10 yrs old Pudge vomits or spits up if he swallows even a bit of his own fur. It's foamy with bits of fur and liquid/saliva and food. He'll do this repeatedly, apparently, until even the tiniest bit of fur is out of him - I have never seen what I would consider a hairball in Pudge's vomit. I determined that he also vomits and has diarrhea when he eats Fancy Feast chicken with beef and whenever he has too much (hard for me to determine what's too much) fish. That's why I use fish primarily as a seasoning on top of other food. During those times he stops eating voluntarily and I have to entice him by tiny watered down meals - and I mean tiny - about a tablespoon or two of warm, stinky, watered down food served frequently and in a very shallow saucer, not his own bowl! Pudge's off- food episodes do not last over 6 - 8 hours, though they invariably start with a few hairs apparently tickling his throat.

Pudge has never had pancreatitis, but I agree that any possible inflammation of your sweet boy's ought to be checked out.

Like your first vet, Pudge's original and confused_cat FD INCOMPETENT vet started him on too much (4 units) of ProZinc!!! I don't know how Pudge survived his hospital stay unless several injections were fur shots. Like your kitty, Pudge is also a big kitty who should be 14 - 15 pounds but was some 18 pounds when diagnosed with FD (no other illness) on December 17, 2011. He's slimmed down a lot, but I do not now and never have withheld canned food since unregulated diabetic kitties are literally starving to death. And, in my opinion, do not need the extra stress of feeling hungry. I looked at your ss, please take this with a 100 grains of salt, but I wondered if your guy needs insulin at all or just change in his diet. A lot of cats tend to be extra sensitive to insulin after hypo episodes. I have read that some fish and beef are known to cause allergies in cats. Know more experienced members will add their comments. ProZinc is great (Pudge is on his 15th day off ProZinc and I think I was about 10 days late in recognizing that I should have stopped it - in retrospect, I was just plain too scared to stop it!!!)

Best wishes, Sophie

 

Hi. My cat threw up food and foam, lost weight, and lost muscle. He was diagnosed with chronic renal failure, and those are three symptoms. I gave him renal supplements for about 6 months -- mostly herbal stuff -- and his renal values were very near normal when he was diagnosed with FD. He had normal BG when he was diagnosed with CRF. So, the original BG test could have been wrong and he could have been having a renal issue due to diabetes or he really has CRF. I don't know, but I still give him the herbs, and I give him subcutaneous fluids, too. He didn't stop throwing up for good until after we started insulin. I keep trying to get his BG down and his dose right, but he is gaining weight and his spine isn't as boney.

For your cat, my immediate concern would be the same as the other members on the board -- ketones, and of course, the problem that you can't give him insulin if he can't keep food down. So, his BG is going to rise, and you have to watch for ketones. Vomiting is a sign of ketoacidosis as well as CRF and regular old FD. I would test him for ketones every time pees (if possible) until he can keep food down even if his BG is below 400. You probably know that if he has ketones, that means an emergency vet visit. You can divide the urine into three containers so that you can test, re-test, and triple test if you get a positive on the first test. If you can't test for ketones, he keeps vomiting tonight, and he has a BG over 300, I would take him to emergency and ask for a ketone test. If its negative, see if the emergency vet thinks he needs subcutaneous fluids while you are there. If you can't take him to emergency, but still can't get a ketone test before morning, I would take him first thing tomorrow to your vet.

It might be that while you are trying to get your cat's dosage right, his kidneys are having a hard time, and it's nothing so drastic as CRF. However, vomiting foam is a classic symptom of CRF (and poisoning, too.) I would ask for renal supplements right away. The renal supplements my cat takes are Standard Process Renal Support (pills), Solidago (pills) and Rehmannia Eight (tincture). Then, as soon as you get the insulin dosage right, I would ask for urine tests and blood tests for CRF. Diabetic cats frequently get CRF eventually.

If you don't want to know whether he has CRF, but just want to give him the supplements, you should watch for dehydration closely. Cats that have CRF cannot concentrate their urine. One of the preliminary tests for CRF is for this symptom. The cat pees out a lot of water and gets dehydrated easily. If you notice that his pee is voluminous and barely smells like cat pee, just faintly like ammonia, you will want to have subcutaneous fluids for him. I give them to my cat myself, but my vet will do for about $17.00 if I buy the materials (from the vet's office) and bring them with me to what the vet calls a "walk back." I bring Max in and wait while a tech takes him back and gives him the fluids for me -- no vet is involved.

Good luck and hang in there. I hope to hear your baby is much better tomorrow.

 

Thanks for the replies!

As far as an obstruction he did have some hairballs in the initial vomit I found this morning but he's been shedding like crazy since he came home so maybe there is still some in his system? After finding the hairball vomit this morning I tried feeding him but after a few minutes he threw up liquid three times and then this afternoon I found a big pile of vomit that appeared to be the wet food he ate last night. At about 3:40pm he threw up smaller amounts of foamy liquid, I had to leave for work shortly after that so I'm hoping he's doing ok as I've been gone for a few hours now. The vomiting is pretty new, he threw up a little bit a few times before we boarded him but nothing like what he's been doing today.

I'll have to check out the symptoms for pancreatitis and CRF and see if those are possibilities, and I do have ketone test strips so I'll have to try and catch him in the act when I get home later.

To Sophie - after my guy had the seizures I switched vets and the new vets did a fructosamine test and determined he didn't need insulin and that he appeared to be making his own...however, that night and the next day his sugars were high so they put him on 0.5 units of PZI and have had to increase twice more since then. I was really hoping that after changing him from dry to wet food maybe he would be diet-controlled but now that his sugars keep running high I'm not sure.

As far as the BFF food being low fat, this is where I get confused about what to feed a diabetic cat - I know it needs to be low carb but can it be high fat? I'm debating getting more Royal Canin Recovery wet food just to get some weight back on him as it's fattier and he likes it but other than that I'm not sure what to feed him, especially as he's been so picky with everything I've tried so far!

Oh and one last thing, ever since I changed him from dry food to wet food his poop has progressively become less solid and waaaay smellier - today it wasn't diarrhea but it wasn't totally solid either - is this normal with wet food or something I should be concerned about?

Thanks so much!!

 

I don't know about the other problems he is having, but I know with all my cats when we switched from dry to wet, their poop went the opposite way, they went from softer stools to smaller firmer stools and the smell greatly decreased. Then last week because originally I was told when I adopted Autumn that she was a dry food addict I got a small bag of kibble just in case I needed to transition her over slowly while still having her eat enough to give insulin too. (first dry food in my house for almost 2 years).
Well she immediately took to the canned food, so I decided to feed the dry to the civies as a treat...every single one of them got loose peel the paint off the walls stools, and the scary part was it was the same color coming out as it was going in

Immediately put them all back on the wet and no more stinky poop and nicely formed stools again.

Mel, Maxwell, Musette, Autumn & The Fur Gang

 

Some good news - my husband got home at 9:45p and there was no puke and the little guy had eaten most of the dry food I left out and still seems to be hungry and his BG was 290. I know we're not out of the woods but it seems a little more positive!

Quick question - with all of the puking my husband isn't sure we should give insulin at 12a, I said we should wait to see what his BG is before deciding - any thoughts?

 

I need help to put weight on my cat

Hello Everyone!
I am new to the forum. I have 8 yeas old cat who was diagnosed with diabetes last year after I mentioned that she lost lot of weight. She went from 10 lbs to 7.8-7.4lbs. She was put on prescribed diabetic can diet MD which is also for weight loss. Now year later she is 6 lbs! I begged doctors to put her on different diet. She is starving, eating like a horse, not vomiting. They are "married" to Hill's diet. I was told to administer Insulin. I started to check her blood sugar to get the baseline. In the meantime I found the wonderful article about making my own kitty food. I did it, cat loves it and her blood sugar went down, but her weight is still the same, so far. I am worry, I don't know how much weight loss she can take. Any advice? I do not feed my cats commercial food any more! It's all garbage!
I would appreciate any suggestion. Thank you. Helen.

 

I need help to put weight on my cat

Hi Helen,

I'm glad you posted for help. Can you copy and paste your information from this thread into a new thread?

Then people can see that you are new here and need some help.