How to prevent cat skin fungus and how often should I bathe her?

There are no hard an fast rules about any of this. If your cat has fleas, a quality topical or oral flea treatment from your vet is most effective. Treating your house and yard will also help reduce the flea population. If you decide to bathe your cat, I recommend about once a week with any pet shampoo, it doesn't have to be a flea shampoo. Trim your cat's nails and apply a drop of plain mineral oil or a small strip of plain, non-medicated ophthalmic ointment to both eyes. Use very warm water to get your cat's coat completely wet, then apply a small amount of shampoo and lather it into the coat well, from tail tip to toes to the end of her nose. The eye ointment will prevent the shampoo from stinging her eyes. Lather her well and let the shampoo sit on for about ten minutes to kill any fleas that are on her. Rinse her well, making sure to get in all the nooks and crannies like her armpits and under her belly, otherwise any shampoo left on can irritate her skin. Towel her off thoroughly and, if she'll allow it, you can use a blow dryer on her on warm, not hot, and keep the dryer moving at all time so you don't make one area too hot and burn her. As far as food is concerned, wet, dry or some combination is between you, your vet and your cat. Some people with fat cats feed exclusively wet food because it contains no grains and therefore has fewer carbohydrates than dry foods. Other cats do perfectly fine on only dry food. My cats are mainly dry food eaters, but I do give them wet food sometimes as a treat.

In general cats do not need baths unless they are extremely dirty, which is very very rare, from the picture i do not see any reason to bath her, just continue the treatment until the fungal infection is resolved and you will see that her fur becomes very healthy and clean.

You may need to do antifungal baths more frequently, as in 2-3 times a week. Lime sulfur dips would also help rid the fungus. There are other oral antifungal medications that may work better, such as ketoconazole. I would discuss these options with Mel's vet. BTW, she is BEAUTIFUL!

Frequent brushing may decrease the amount of shedding. Fleas can be treated with a topical preventative such as Frontline or Revolution. You can purchase these from your veterinarian. Use a topical or oral flea preventative for at least 3 consecutive months, preferably year round. An oral medication such as Capstar can quickly kill any adult fleas on your cat. Again, purchase this from your vet. You will also need to treat the environment. This includes vacuuming everywhere your cat goes and washing all bedding. Follow up with an area treatment (flea bomb) to prevent reinfestation. Cays usually keep themselves very clean and don't require bathing more than once every 6-8 weeks if not longer. If your cat is not grooming regularly, have him examined by your vet to diagnose illness or injury as either can commonly cause a change in behavior or grooming habits.

Plory should be fine being bathed that frequently. Make sure you are using a pet shampoo. An oatmeal type shampoo tends to be more moisturizing and less likely to dry out the skin. Watch for any evidence of excessively dry skin. Definitely keeping him indoors would prevent him from getting so dirty but it is a balancing act between happiness and cleanliness! I hope this helps and please feel free to post any additional questions.

Unfortunately, there isn't much you can do from home, especially if medications aren't helping. I would seek out another exam in person and have the vet take a scraping of the fungal site to send to a lab for testing. This can help determine what exactly it is and the best medication to put on it to help. Medicated shampoos and oral medications can also be helpful and may need a few courses to fully resolve the issue. I would definitely keep the affected area cleaned and trimmed/clipped so you can monitor spread and more easily get medications on the affected area. Since that spot in the photo also looks like it may be infected with bacteria (abscessed) in addition, oral antibiotics from your vet is probably another good idea. Until you can get to the vet (which I recommend doing ASAP), keeping the area clean and dry, and keeping Zuzu from scratching at or rubbing it with an Elizabethan (cone) collar (if it doesn't rub on the spot) is best. Since fungal infections can be spread to other pets and people, washing hands, bedding, clothing, etc is also a good idea to reduce spread.

Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach! You can definitely bathe her perhaps every 2-3 months. Also, you could consider a diet such as Hills metabolic weight management diet to try to get her to lose weight. Good luck!