My cats have diarrhea and soft poop. How can I help their digestion?

I would recommend to try switching them to just a plain boiled chicken diet for a few days to see if this settles their stomach and add in some probiotics. I believe you can buy proviable paste online and give as directed. My concern though is that they may have a parasite or bacteria that they aren't finding in their fecal samples. If they aren't improving, contact your vet to see if you can either bring in just a fecal sample or deworm both of the prophylactically. I hope this helps!

You can try home made diet and probiotics for a week. GI distress from new food or treats generally only lasts a few days. If the diarrhea persists, worsens, or he becomes uninterested in food, I'd recommend taking him to see his vet for a physical exam.

I would actually recommend starting with a vet visit to check for intestinal parasites at his age. And then explore different food options or pursue other testing as the vet recommends, because there is almost certainly an underlying issue (although that doesn't mean it's something serious or dangerous. Probiotics, a short course of antibiotics, a hypoallergenic diet can all help with diarrhea in cats. If you can't get to the vet and want to try fiber, you can mix in unflavored metamucil with his food (aiming for about 2 tsp) once a day to see if that helps, but it's probably going to be a waste of money (both for the metamucil and the wasted food if he won't eat it). Good luck!

You can find a feline probiotic to add to her diet or try a sensitive stomach formula food or a prescription such as Science Diet I/D. If this does not improve the stool she may need to see a vet. Older cats can get an inflammatory bowel disease and stress can definitely make it worse. It will take some vitamin supplements and daily medication but usually improves by then. If not then they will look into further testing such as an ultrasound or a biopsy.

If Simba is having no other symptoms other than soft stool you may want to consider adding fiber to his diet. There are some commercial diets that have increased fiber content (senior diets are typically higher in fiber). Another option would be to simply add a tablespoon of fiber powder (like Metamucil) to his food once a day. If this does not help then you may want to consider bringing a stool sample to your vet to be checked to ensure nothing else is going on. I hope this helps. Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach. Best of luck.

Usually a probiotic would help diarrhea, however some probiotics and digestive enzyme supplements are more like treats with a lot of other ingredients that might cause stomach upset. As long as Kitty is eating and drinking normally with no vomiting I think it’s okay to wait 1-2 days for it to resolve. If the diarrhea is very frequent or watery or has blood present you should see your vet right away. It should be fine to try pumpkin now, but sometimes excess fiber makes diarrhea worse so I would stop after two tries if you don’t see improvement. And even though it isn’t pleasant to think about, cats lick their own feces all the time when they’re grooming. Nothing to worry about!

If these cats have not been on long-term medication like probiotics and metronidazole, I would start these. Also, all cats might benefit from a food-allergy diet trial like Hills z/d fed exclusively for 8-10 weeks. This helps to rule out food allergies as a cause for chronic diarrhea. If these things don't work, you may have to actually send out fecal tests for culture and sensitivity to have done at an outside laboratory as most vet clinics are only equipped to do basic parasite fecal floats and smears in-house. Your female who is having behavior issues may benefit from anti-anxiety medications like Zylkene or Lorazepam, or even an anti-depressant. Since all three are young cats, it's most likely that they are sharing a parasitic or other intestinal infection that is causing chronic diarrhea, so I think you are on the right tract to continue to monitor for coccidiosis and giardiasis. They may need much longer-term treatment to clear these kinds of infection. Hope that helps!