Complete Care for Your Aging Cat - Amy Shojai [96]
Golden Moments: Baby Kitty’s Toothache
Sandi Maltese of Pueblo West, Colorado, has always loved black cats. She knew that adopting Baby Kitty (BK for short) would save his life. He returned the favor at age 13 when he alerted her to a fire in the basement. “I was working in the kitchen last year and he started meowing at me,” says Sandi. “I thought he was hungry. His food was downstairs and usually he leads me downstairs. This time he stopped halfway down.”
Smoke was everywhere, and she found a cigarette butt smoldering in the wastebasket that could have grown into a tragic fire. “I was done for the day and wouldn’t have found it otherwise,” she says.
BK is skittish around strangers and even hides from the doorbell. But he enjoys being an indoor/outdoor cat and loves keeping Sandi and her husband, John, company in their home offices when they work. “He’s very loving with us, and a terrific pet.” She trained the 10-pound cat to come inside from his hunting expeditions with a special voice call, and bribes of cocktail shrimp.
The next year, she noticed the 14-year-old cat wasn’t feeling well. “He was drinking way too much. I used to hardly ever seen him drink,” says Sandi. She decided to take him to the Best Friends Animal Hospital for a checkup.
“He was running a temperature of 103,” she says. Other tests, including an X-ray and blood screening, indicated BK was in kidney failure. “I lost it there in the vet’s office.” She knew the condition was very serious.
The first recommendation was to slowly switch his food to a therapeutic kidney diet. “He hated it, wouldn’t eat it,” says Sandi. She worked hard to change BK’s mind for over two weeks. But when he began to stay under the bed all day and even ignored his wicker sleeping “cat house,” she took him back to the vet.
“I left him overnight, they sedated him, and found three teeth so bad they needed to come out,” says Sandi. They started him on antibiotics immediately and planned dental surgery for that weekend to remove the decayed teeth and clean up the abscesses. Sandi would need to give him antibiotic pills twice a day for a couple of weeks after the surgery as well. “The cat must have been in horrible pain,” says Sandi. “The vet said the infection was so bad it had to start months ago. Intellectually, I know he hid it from me, but I still feel guilty.”
The recovery from the surgery has been a slow, rough process. “My three vets—Dr. Cynthia Lopez, Dr. Roger Mauer and Dr. Cantchaola—have been absolutely wonderful,” she says. “The surgery cost about $525, but I’ve been in there four or five times since then and they’ve not charged me.”
She’s noticed a big improvement in BK in just the past two or three days. “He’s feeling better, drinking better, and he’s already eating good.” She knew he was on the road to recovery when he began demanding his shrimp bribe each morning and reminding her if she’s late.
Dr. Mauer explained that dental disease sometimes leads to kidney problems, and BK’s kidney test might have been a false reading due to his tooth problems. Sandi hopes so. She plans to have another kidney evaluation once he’s fully recovered.
“He always gets a yearly check up. And they always checked his teeth,” says Sandi. “He gets better care than me, but he’s my baby. And from now on, he’s going in every 6 months for checkups.”
Feeding For Health
Although these diets can help with dental care, be sure the diet itself is appropriate for your cat’s total health requirements. The need for a therapeutic kidney diet may override dental concerns, for example.
Eukanuba Dental Defense System (added to many adult Eukanuba foods)
Friskies Dental Diet
Hill’s Science Diet Oral Care
Hill’s Prescription Diet Feline t/d (only available from veterinarian)
Purina Veterinary Diets, DH Dental Health
ROYAL CANIN Veterinary Diet