Medicating Cats Is Easier Than You Think

Caring for our elderly cats has a lot in common with running a nursing home. With the exception of Onyx and Coswell, everyone over 12 years old --Amber, Tasha, Brandon, Ginger, Gloria, Keja, Missy, Mama and Simon—has one or more chronic (and/or terminal) health problem.

Their combined list of ailments reads like a vet school textbook: Allergies, anemia, blindness, brain seizures, cancer (mast cell, cutaneous lymphoma, parathyroid carcinoma), cardiomyopathy, chronic sinusitis, diabetes, herpes, hypertension, inflammatory bowel disease, kidney failure, liver disease, chronic pancreatitis, ringworm and thyroid (hypo- and hyper-) disease. We keep them as comfortable as we can through weekly administration of over 200 different pills, injections, fluid therapies, ointments and special grooming support. We also take them for veterinary check-ups and lab work several times a year just to be sure their treatments are helping.

To do this much medicating is not as time-consuming as you’d think – once you establish a system and stick to it. What works for us is kitting the medications weekly in advance – every Saturday afternoon. Each cat has his or her own weekly pill box (divided into daily compartments) to hold them. Injections and liquid meds are drawn up for the week and then stored in plastic boxes–each labeled with the cat’s name and medication directions. Supplies like ointments, cotton balls for eye-cleaning; needles for SQ fluids are counted out and stored in labeled plastic baggies.

We serve morning meds with breakfast – when the cats are awake and active. It goes very quickly since they’re all kitted so by the time the cats finish eating they’ve also been medicated. Specialized treatments like nose-flushing and SQ fluids wait until late afternoon when we give the evening meds. Because each medication is stored both by day and by cat, it’s easy to make sure you don’t miss a dose just by counting what’s left in their containers. By Saturday morning everything should be empty and ready to be filled again for the next week.

It’s not as difficult as you may think to get cats to take their medicine. Most– once they settle into the routine of being pilled – are easy. It simply becomes part of their day. Occasionally we’ll have a cat that resists one or more medications and if so, we ask the vet for an alternative – a liquid instead of a pill or an injection instead of a liquid. If it’s a short-duration medication like an antibiotic they only need for a week to ten days, we’ll tough it out to make sure they complete the medication in spite of their objections. But if the cat still resists a medication that they’ll be on indefinitely, we respect their desire to be left alone and discontinue treatment.

Here's some tips on medicating cats:

• Use a pill pocket. Some cats will eat the pill on their own if you put it in a pill pocket – at least until the novelty wears off. But even if you still have to put the pocket in their mouth, the taste is much more enjoyable than that of most pills. And, if your cat gets more than one pill at a time, the pocket helps you group them.

• Never try to pill a cat that’s in motion – you’ll just make them run. Wait until they’re sitting comfortably and approach them from behind or from the side. If you approach from the front they still may run.

• If the cat is small, try picking them up and cradling them while you pill them.

• If the cat is large, try sitting on them from behind while you pill them. Use your legs to hold them still so your hands are free to insert the medicine.

• After giving a pill, rub the cat’s throat a bit to help them swallow. Watch the cat for a moment to make sure the pill doesn’t come back out. If you’re giving both pills and liquid meds, give the pill first and use the liquid med to wash the pill down the throat.

• If the cat is difficult to pill, check to see if it’s okay to crush their pill into a powder. If so, you can mix the powder in a small dollop of baby food or milk – but make sure you watch to make sure they finish the treat – and, in multi-cat households -- keep other cats away.

Sooner or later most cats will need medication to manage chronic or terminal illness. It may be nerve-wracking when you begin, but you –and your cat – will soon adjust. With appropriate care, you can extend not only the life of your cat, but also improve its quality.