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"Cystitis" in Cats
added 26th January 2012
Cats, as so many of us who keep them have learnt, have very sensitive bladders. One of the commonest reasons we vets see them is because they’re having trouble urinating. “Cystitis” (or more properly, Feline Lower Urinary Tract Disorder, FLUTD) in both male and female cats is usually recognised by 3 major signs:
1) Pain when urinating
2) Difficulty urinating (e.g. spotting, urinating in unusual places)
3) Blood in the urine.
Unlike humans, however, most cases of cystitis in cats aren’t actually caused by an infection (in older cats, it can be up to 25%, but in cats under 8 years old, less than 10% are associated with any bacterial growth).
By far the commonest cause is called FIC: Feline Idiopathic Cystitis, accounting for ? of all cases. In this strange condition, the primary cause is stress. This causes change in the nerve supply to the bladder, making it’s protective lining thinner, allowing urine to scald the sensitive membranes. This is painful, resulting in more stress, so escalates into an ever worsening spiral. The stress-event varies from cat to cat, but may be as major as moving house or a new baby; or as (apparently) minor as the litter tray being moved, or a change in diet.
To manage this, the key is to control stress - covered litter trays, a steady routine, and Feliway or Zylkene if needed all help. Its also very important to maximise water intake; if your cat will drink, that’s great (fountains are really good for many cats); if not, a diluting food like the Royal Canin Urinary Dry Food or, even better, Pouches can be really useful. However, sometimes its not enough, so there are a wide variety of supplements available to help reinforce the bladder lining. The old favorite was always Cystaid, but there are now a number of newer ones, including Cystease, Furinaid (which comes in a tasty liquid form for easy dosing) and the brand-new Cystophan, which also contains L-tryptophan, which is known to act as a de-stressing agent in its own right.
The second most common cause of cystitis is a build-up of stones (or calculi) which irritate the bladder lining. Eventually, they can pass into the urethra (the tube carrying urine out of the bladder) and block it, most commonly in toms (especially neutered ones). This can be an emergency - a “blocked cat” is all too common (usually at about 6pm on a Friday night!). If left untreated, it can be fatal, leading to bladder rupture and shock. Once the stones have formed, they will need veterinary attention. However, managing crystals in the urine to prevent stones is very important, and can be done by using special diets - the Hills Feline s/d is specially designed for dissolving Struvite crystals. The all-new Hills Feline c/d Multicare range is designed to help with all the major causes of cystitis: it dissolves struvite, and addresses FIC, oxalate crystals and urinary plugs.
This month, we’re running special offers on our whole Urinary Range! We’ve got specially reduced prices on all the urinary supplements, the Royal Canin Urinary range and Hills s/d. And to celebrate the launch of the new Hills c/d Multicare, we’re offering a FREE Hills Urinary Cat Pack (containing two types of food, cat litter and loads of information about FLUTD) with every order of marked Special Offer c/d food!
Are your dogs ready for the Christmas Countdown?
added 22nd November 2011
With the nights drawing in, and Fireworks Night behind us, that means...
Christmas is coming!
And this year we’re preparing nice and early, so you’ve got plenty of time to choose presents and treats for the big day!
We’ve offering a range of Christmas Specials - including toys, treats, and even Christmas Stockings and Advent Calendars! They’re all on specially reduced prices, to make Christmas that bit easier!
We’re also still running the Aching Joints special offers, with a Free Gift with every qualifying item bought, and we’ve got an incredible offer on Hills Reduced Calorie J/D: £46.44 for a 12kg bag - that’s a huge 33% off RRP! J/D is the Joint Diet, and is specially formulated, and clinically proven, to ease aching joints, preserve healthy cartilage and help dogs with arthritis walk, run, play and climb stairs more easily - its available only while stocks last, so don’t delay... Also, check out our other Hills and Royal Canin range - we’ve got loads of other good deals running this winter.
Remember, especially at this time of year, not to let your dog get overweight with all the extra treats and snacks. Extra exercise is vital (perhaps buy an energetic toy to go with any treats?!), and if you’re feeding lots of snacks, consider reducing their main meals proportionately. Perhaps consider the Royal Canin Satiety Control or the Hills R/D and W/D - dog foods specially designed to reduce calorie intake but still leave the dog feeling full!
Why have horses just started to suffer from stress?
added 29th April 2011
The answer to that is that they haven’t of course! though there is probably fewer long term skilled horsemen who spend their lives caring for them these days, who depended mainly on a fibre based diet as the back bone of their normal routine. As grazing animals their relatively small stomachs require a continual supply of food and also saliva to maintain a balanced digestive system, and with an increased dependence on compounded feeds, which supply the nutrition in small rapidly eaten meals, there are as a result long periods when the stomach may have very little to do. The changes in the horses body can be measured by the amount of cortisol in the horse’s blood stream, and can be seen in the horses stomach by the appearance of gastric ulcers
Anything which upsets the eating pattern, the horse’s routine, such as a long journey with nothing to eat, being unable to settle in a new field, or a change of environment will change the amount of free acid floating around in the stomach. So addressing the causes will in many cases prevent the problem becoming obvious.
Because of the complexity of the condition there is more than one way in which you can reduce the stress on your horse. It can be prevented by thinking about the way that your horse is introduced to others, and it is important to remember this with foals as they are particularly sensitive to changes at weaning time. Remember to feed plenty of long fibre at all times especially when travelling, to promote saliva production and give the stomach acids something to work on.
You can use Zylkene or a product such as Equistro mag which work in different ways and reduce the excitement of changes in situation, and can be used in advance of these type of problem situations, or can be just used as a quietner for horses which get wound up for a whole variety of reasons.
A common outcome of stress can be the development of ulcers either on the upper or lower parts of the stomach, and Pronutrin is a granular food additive which will create a gel like cover over the stomach lining as a protection. Despite all the attempts to avoid stress affecting your horse and for when all the above has failed to prevent the symptoms of temperament change, weight loss, performance reduction, poor coat and even recurrent bouts of colic then an examination which involves the passing of a flexible camera (gastroscope) down into the stomach to diagnose the presence of gastric ulcers. These are areas of damage where the stomach surface is disrupted, and bleeding may well occur. They are graded from 1-5 (pictures below) with 5 being the most severe. Once diagnosed then vets will usually prescribe an extended course of a product called Gastroguard which affects the production of acid by the stomach lining and allows healing to take place.
Once diagnosed it is important that all the first aid measures are given much greater emphasis than usual, to prevent recurrence and prevents you and your horse from enjoying themselves
Equine Melanomas - Can You Afford To Ignore Them?
added 28th March 2011
I recently wrote on our Facebook page about a gelding I saw with melanomas. This prompted me to explain a little more about this common skin disease in horses.
What are melanomas?
Melanomas are primarily skin tumours. They are seen mostly in older grey or white horses. In fact a recent study showed that 80% of grey horses develop melanomas after the age of 15 years. Occasionally they can be seen in younger horses, including foals. If you own a grey horse, it may well be the case of WHEN he develops this condition, rather than IF.
Melanomas often look like hard round lumps under the skin. They are commonly found round the anus, groin, mouth and behind the angle of the jaw, but essentially, can appear anywhere on the body. They are generally slow growing but multiple lumps can appear in any area. Although slow to grow, they can reach large sizes. They can sometimes ulcerate on the surface when large and can discharge a waxy, tarry kind of substance when present in large numbers.
Should I worry about melanomas?
About to thirds of melanomas are benign. This means that they may grow where they originally develop, but wont seed out and spread to other areas of the body, such as the lungs, liver or brain. However, this also infers that occasionally melanomas may be malignant and spread to the internal organs- causing drastic results.
I once saw a grey gelding with melanomas around its sheath. He then developed terrible breathing problems. Further tests revealed that he had malignant melanomas which had spread to the lungs. He sadly was euthanased as there was nothing that could be done. On post-mortem there were hundreds of melanomas all through his lungs and ribcage. Thankfully, this is a very rare occurrence and I have only seen it once in 10 years as a horse vet.
Melanomas, on the whole, cause very little worry to most owners. However, if they develop around the jaw or mouth they may interfere with riding on the bit. Also any melanomas around the girth or saddle region may get rubbed when ridden.
Bearing the possibility of malignancy in mind, and also that melanomas can look like other forms of skin tumour, including sarcoids, it is worth taking a biopsy to confirm what the lump is and also to check whether it is benign or malignant.
Can you treat melanomas?
There are a number of treatment options, and research is ongoing into more ways to kill off the skin tumour. Options include:
1) Do nothing, but keep a close eye on the growth of the lump- also known as “watchful waiting.”
2) Surgical removal- this is best done early when the tumour is small and can be easily removed. This can be done by your vet. It gets much harder to do when large and then will warrant referral to a hospital.
3) Cryotherapy- removal via freezing (a bit like wart removal in people). This is not always that successfuland requires several attempts (cycles).
4) Laser removal- a much better procedure than cryotherapy. Mostly done at referral hospitals.
5) Cimetidine- an oral antacid- used to treat reflux or indigestion in man! This has been found to retard the growth in a number of cases, but does not work in every case.
Complications as a result melanomas:
If left unchecked, melanomas may get to a such a size that they start to have negative effects on the well-being of your horse:
Large groups of melanomas around the anus can make it harder to pass dung, In addition, in the summer months dung can collect around the lumps as it is passed and so attract flies. I have known some horses to develop repeat episodes of impaction colic as quite often the lumps are also present in the rectum, so partially block the output of dung.
Melanomas around the sheath may cause sheath swelling as they block lymphatic drainage. This is common in older grey geldings.
Large melanomas around the girth or mouth may make it impossible to ride. For this reason, it is often worth removing melanomas in areas where tack sits before they reach a size to cause a problem.
In Summary:
On the whole, melanomas in the horse, unlike man, are not a major problem as they are slow to grow and generally benign. There is always the odd exception to the rule, so this is worth bearing in mind when you buy a horse with melanomas. Also realise that they often more likely to cause problems in later life if they have grown to a large size. In many cases, the horse may be in his late teens or early twenties when complications arise- and so any veterinary attention required may not be covered by your insurance policy.
Research is still ongoing, particularly in the USA to see if we can find easier methods of dealing with these annoying lumps!
By Charlie Briggs MRCVS
Spring Campaign - Man's Best Friend
added 1st March 2011
Sadly for all of us, “man’s best friend” is host to a wide range of other, less welcome guests! Dogs, no matter how well cared for, are prone to a variety of internal parasites. This month, as part of our Spring Clean Campaign we’re running a special feature on Worms and Worming.
There are two main “families” of worms in dogs, Roundworms and Tapeworms.
There are many, many roundworms that can infect dogs, living in many organs, including the lungs (Filaroides), heart (Angiostrongylus) and in the intestines (Toxocaris and Toxascaris). Some of these can even infect puppies through the milk from infected dams! However, dogs who hunt or root around outside are at a higher risk, as many worms are transmitted through intermediate hosts like rodents and snails. In dogs that travel abroad, the heartworm (Dirofilaria) is a major risk, as dogs can become infected after mosquito bites. All of these roundworms can cause serious health issues, from malabsorption/malnutrition disease to heart failure, but some are also a human health hazard. The larvae of Toxocara canis is shed in dog faeces, and if ingested (especially by children who don’t wash their hands well enough!) it can infect humans; but not as a worm in the gut – it is the commonest cause of visceral larval migrans, where the worms leave the gut and go crawling around inside the body... Not the nicest of conditions, so it’s very important to keep on top of your worming!
There are also the tapeworms to worry about – the most common are the Taenia species, whose larvae hide as cysts in a wide range of animals, including sheep, rabbits and some deer; when eaten by a dog, they hatch out and start to grow... some can grow to over five metres long! The segments crawl out of the anus to infect the intermediate hosts, and look like grains of rice. There’s another type (Dipylidium caninum) which can be caught from fleas! The third UK species is called Echinococcus, and is mainly found in Wales and the Westcountry. Although the actual worm isn’t very harmful, it can cause hydatid cysts (large, fluid-filled growths) in other species unlucky enough to be infected, which when eaten by the dog, lead to infection. The cysts can cause disease in sheep, cattle, horses; and when in humans can grow to an enormous size and cause severe illness, especially if it ruptures, as it causes anaphylactic shock, often proving fatal.
