Well I took both Sky and Ziggy Stardust to my vet today for their annual exams. Sky has always been congested but lately he's also been having some coughing/sneezing fits which have been scaring me. I explained this to my vet and she said that he could have asthmabut it may also just be more of seasonal thing. He had an x-ray taken and she said that it did look like he had some slight inflammation which indicates asthma. He's now going to be taking 1/4 of a Theophylline pill,which is an airway dilator, every evening for about 3-4 weeks. Luckily he loves pill pockets so he'll be very easy to pill. If he's still not improving in 1 week then he'll also be taking a low dose of pred to help with inflammation. Hopefully he won't also need this.
He weights 13.5lbs so he's actually gained some weight from last years 12.6lbs. Last year he was having some diarrhea problems due to a parasite that he and Pearl had so that's why he didn't weigh as much. I still need to watch his current weight though and I think he's better off being only 13lbs or so. Please send some positive vibes that this medicine will work well for him. Thanks.
Ziggy has two problems that I already knew about before her visit. Her gums on her upper back molars are very red and they have moderate gingivitis. I've been brushing my cats teeth once a week with the rubber finger brush but I just read today that this isn't as good as using a toothbrush so I'm going to start using a toothbrush. I also have to brush Ziggy's teeth 2 times a week and hopefully this will help with her current gingivitis.
Her other problem is that she's overweight. I had already guessed that she weighed 15-16lbs. When the vet tech weighed her she weighed 15.9lbs.I was pretty much right on but still shocked. Last year she weighed 14.1lbs. All of my cats are on Innova Evo which is very high in calories but I don't free feed them. She's currently getting about 1/2 cup a day of dry and then some canned mixed in but I also usually let her have some of her siblings leftovers too. I know bad meowmie.
My vet wants me to feed her no more than 1/4 cup of dry food and also feed her 1/2 can of wet food per day. I need to bring her back in 1 month and have her weighed to make sure that she's losing weight and also to make sure that she's not losing too much too fast. My vet wants her to lose at least 2lbs. I also bought a bag of Innova Evo Weight Management dry food and everyone seemed to like it. I'll be feeding her this exclusively and then mixing it in to the others until the regular Evo is gone. Then I'll just switch over to the weight management formula. Hopefully everything will work out. If she's still not losing weight then my vet said that she'll need to switch to a different diet. Wish me luck.Sorry to ramble on so long. At least both Pearl and Storm's annual exams went well without any problems.
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