My cat is vomiting, not eating. Could it be IBD? What are next steps?

Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach! This probably just means that her IBD is no longer being controlled on the current medications and she just needs further management of her condition. I highly recommend that you have reevaluated by a veterinarian for further assessment. At the very least they can make sure to treat her symptoms so that you can get her to feel better. They can also add medications to try to get her condition under control again. Good luck!

I would talk to your vet about submitting a GI panel or performing biopsies. Even with normal ultrasounds, IBD or lymphoma may not be able to be diagnosed. Empirical deworming may be indicated. Steroid trials may help. Has the thyroid level been checked? There is so much more information we need to be able to help you in this complicated case. I would recommend choosing a Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach consult so we can better evaluate what the tests and results have been to help you decide what steps should be next.

Thank you for submitting your question regarding Patsy. Has she had an abdominal ultrasound yet? I will typically recommend this as well as a gastrointestinal specific blood panel prior to biopsies. I assess cobalamin and folate levels as well pancreatic values such as TLI and PLI. These results can help to guide treatment. I hope this information helps!

I'm sorry to hear your cat is having GI issues. How was your cat diagnosed with pancreatitis? If the remainder of bloodwork was normal and the fPLI was positive, I would consider X-rays and possibly an abdominal ultrasound for more information. Pancreatitis can be a chronic condition that requires diet changes, B12 supplementation and long-term medications. Pancreatitis can be concurrent with another underlying GI issue, such as IBD or lymphoma. Ultrasound can give more information, but these conditions can only be definitively diagnosed with intestinal biopsies. As the issue isn't resolving, I would recommend your cat be re-evaluated and further diagnostics potentially fine, either by your regular veterinarian or an internal medicine specialist. Good luck!

Hi there and thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach to address your concern. With IBD, I would also recommend using B12 supplementation such as Cobalequin. Cobalequin is available online and is easy to get. This is basically a B12 supplement and is extremely bioavailable even in the presence of GI disease such as IBD. A different diet such as a hydrolyzed protein diet (a prescription diet) may also be helpful. You will need a prescription for a hydrolyzed diet and your veterinarian can provide this for you. I would try these things and see if they help at all with the soft stool / diarrhea / poor appetite. Please let me know if you have any other questions or concerns and I would be happy to help you further.

Couple of concerns here. Were you given an option of referral to obtain a definitive diagnosis? Differentiation of these diseases requires biopsy. Did your pet have an ultrasound? Also having a chemotherapy medication made in to a liquid is a big safety concern unless a pet has a feeding tube. Were you counseled about safe drug and urine/fecal handling with this drug? Also has your kitty had blood monitoring with this drug for safety? There are typically some other things we do with cats with GI disease but this is case dependent. Also the dosing for chlorambucil is different for different cats. What would really be best, if you feel that you need more help beyond your vet, you could request referral to a specialist (either an internist or an oncologist). I hope this helps and thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach!

Hello, and thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach. I'm sorry to hear about Portifoy's diarrhea troubles! It's not clear from the history what sort of duration we're talking about, but it can take time (sometimes weeks) to get IBD symptoms under control. Many cats improve much faster if put on a tapering dose of steroids (often prednisolone is used), so you could talk to your vet about this. Depending on what diagnostics were performed that led to the IBD diagnosis, those symptoms could indicate IBD, but could also be consistent with a food sensitivity/allergy, or GI lymphoma, among other things. An abdominal ultrasound helps with a diagnosis, if that hasn't been done, with a GI biopsy being the ideal diagnostic (although that's also quite invasive, and your vet can help you decide if it's worth the risk). At this point, I'd recommend communicating with your vet and letting them know how Port's doing, as they may have been hoping his symptoms would improve with the medications you mentioned - but they may want to change things (such as adding a steroid, or discussing the next diagnostic step) once they know he's still having diarrhea. Feel free to request a consultation if you'd like to discuss Port's case in more detail. I hope this helps!