Mulan is a tricoloured cat from Jurong West and was found ill by her rescuer Michelle of CWS. She was brought to Dr Poon at Island Vet in Jurong and thereafter found to have inflammatory bowel disease or IBD. This diagnosis was reached after many diagnostics were done including an ultrasound. She turns out not to have lymphoma (common cancer with related symptoms), thankfully. IBD is dangerous in that without management, the cat can go on to develop anemia, dehydration, not to mention daily pain from inflammation of the gut and behind.
Her IBD responded to limited treatments. Prednisolone, charcoal, but not other antidiarrhoeals or drugs for the digestive tract. She responds to herbal and nutraceutical treatments such as slippery elm bark and probiotics.
IBD requires a restricted diet. It should not be processed food like kibbles but she got a bit better on Hill's i/d which was a temporary diet for her. Canned food gives her diarrhoea too. The best option for IBD is a single protein source homemade meal. This will also minimise her need for medication. The recommended protein sources are chicken, venison, rabbit, lamb, or salmon. It has to be cooked to minimise the bacteria in the gut. It should be complemented with fibre which we do with oat bran (also recommended). The meat has to be fed with stock boiled from the bones for 2-3 hours, so as to make it complete with calcium as muscle meat alone is deficient in that. Once a cat does well on a homemade diet, the medication can be reduced.
Supplements that are recommended for IBD include slippery elm bark, curcumin, licorice, probiotics, digestive enzymes and l-glutamine. We also add in goldenseal, vitamins B, C and E, omega 3 and colloidal silver.
Mulan is a very vocal cat! Loves scratching her cardboard box to relieve stress. She has a bad habit of sleeping in her litter box and is often smelly with pee, kicking litter everywhere, that sort of thing.. She is doing well in that her poop is nice and firm with very little anal soiling. She is however not taking to the chicken we are converting her to. So now we are trying salmon. If she still doesn't want to eat that, we will try lamb. Once she takes to one protein source, we can consider adding in other ingredients like vegetable or fruit puree, rosemary for flavour.
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