Hi! I adopted an FIV+ cat this past August. From reading online, I didn’t think they would get sick too much more often than FIV- cats. I decided to adopt knowing that some might be turned off by his FIV status and knowing that I am lucky to be able to afford vet bills.
BUT this is the third upper respiratory tract infection he has had in 5 months. Each time, it doesn’t seem to clear it on his own without antibiotics. I’m concerned he’ll end up with antibiotic resistance over time if I keep doing this.
The first illness, he was given both oral antibiotics and eye drops for 2 weeks. The second time (several months later) his eyes weren’t as bad and they gave me a supply of oral antibiotics only for 1 week (wish it could have been 2…didn’t realize they only gave me enough for one). It’s been a couple of months and he’s sick again. I’m gonna take him in a few days if this doesn’t start to clear again.
Some notes:
-He is an indoor only cat. I do not have other pets.
-He was swabbed for herpes one of the times and it was negative. One of the times he had a mycoplasma infection and the other time he was not swabbed.
-He was tested as FeLV- at the shelter. But I suppose if he had a very early infection, it might not have shown up.
-He mostly acts pretty normal during his infections thankfully (eating, using the bathroom, etc)…just maybe sometimes a tad less active.
-I’m going to start giving him lysine powder daily in his food (twice a day). The vet had me give it to him for the duration of the first infection, but I may as well just continue it forever since it seems fairly benign.
Thanks, guys!
Be meticulous with the cat toilet, and since he has issues with respiratory infections, make sure the cat litter does not create too much dust. Other than that, keep weighting the cat on the regular, since weight loss is an early indicator for issues. A yearly blood count, serum biochemical analysis, and urine analysis can catch issues early.
Thanks for taking a FIV+ cat in! My mother’s two cats were FIV+ (she was helping out a shelter with harboring FIV+ cats, and those two stayed in the end), and they lived for years without major issues with regular screening and early prevention if issues popped up.
Shoot yeah I forgot I was going to keep buying “low dust” litter when I first was wondering if both he and I were getting allergies, but I haven’t bought “low dust” ones recently. Even still it looks like the standard clay litter is always dusty even if it has a “low dust” formulation.
I’m not really too keen on switching the type of litter to be something like those wood pellets either. Seems like the other types are more complicated and a lot of cats don’t like them. He’s used to standard clay litter.