Feel free to leave comments on this doc, especially if you see information that seems incorrect.
<aside> 💡 I am not a veterinarian or any kind of licensed healthcare worker, only a scientifically literate and extremely devoted cat caretaker. This advice is not intended to substitute for veterinary advice or clinical procedures. This advice is only intended to help inform you about complementary, supplementary, & preventative home care that it is safe for a layperson to administer.
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The vets I saw when my cat had an emergency did not educate me on home care or warning signs to look out for, and even when they did give me tips, they didn't mention them until things had already gotten serious.
This makes sense — they were busy around the clock with surgery & other patients and didn't have time to provide this level of communication, as is often the case in Western health care. But it was still frustrating and scary. If I had known more information from day 1 of my cat getting sick, things probably wouldn't have gotten nearly as bad.
If possible, try to get a veterinarian who specializes in cats. https://catfriendly.com/find-a-veterinarian/
<aside> 💡 I have put countless hours of work, sweat, and tears into this guide! If you find this guide helpful, and you are financially able, please consider supporting my resourcing work via Patreon, or making a donation via Ko-fi. Thanks <3
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It is extremely important for cats to eat every day.
Human appetite intuition cannot be applied to cats. Most humans can skip food entirely for 24 hours, or eat much less than usual for a week, and bounce back to full strength on our own. It's not healthy, but it’s also not life threatening unless you have particular contraindicated medical conditions.
Cats are desert-adapted obligate carnivores. Humans are omnivores. Cat digestive biology is extremely different from human digestive biology. Do not apply the same intuition onto them.
When cats eat nothing for 1-2 days, or are partially anorexic (~50% of usual diet) for several days, they become at risk for hepatic lipidosis, which is where the liver begins to fail because it becomes overtaxed and injured from excessively metabolizing the body's fat reserves into energy.
The approach to this is typically an extended period of closely-monitored, aggressive nutritional support for some weeks until the liver is able to heal itself and the cat can eat normally again without any help. Ironically, the condition progressively bootstraps itself by making the cat feel more and more averse to eating.
<aside> 💡 Early prevention through consistent nutritional intake is critical. Unfortunately, vets are extremely overworked and might not think to warn you about the risk of hepatic lipidosis until it has become serious enough to warrant hospitalization.
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If a cat refuses to eat, they have not necessarily lost the will to live; they may simply have a treatable medical condition that temporarily makes it difficult for them to eat. Do not euthanize a cat solely based on a refusal to eat. Keep getting food into them.
If your cat refuses to eat enough normally, is at risk for hepatic lipidosis, and cannot be syringe-fed, they will have to be intubated and tube-fed in order to adequately meet their nutritional needs until the liver can recover.