How to Deal with Cat Diarrhoea

Your cat’s litter box is unusually smelly, and when you go to scoop it, you find a liquid mess. Gross. It’s nobody’s favourite problem, but diarrhoea is something that most cat parents will face at least once. For this reason, I spoke to Dr Audrey K Cook, a professor of Small Animal Internal Medicine, to learn about this common malady.

First of all, diarrhoea or any change in stool consistency is a non-specific clinical symptom, not a disease in and of itself. It could indicate many problems going on with your cat’s gut, or even with their emotions. When your cat’s stool gets loose and watery, there are many things that may have triggered it. “Diarrhoea simply tells us that the gastrointestinal (GI) tract isn’t working like it is supposed to,” says Dr Cook. “This is often due to a disease specifically related to the GI tract but can also be a sign that something else is wrong, such as the pancreas or thyroid gland. Anxiety and stress can even cause diarrhoea.”

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How loose does a stool need to be in order to be considered diarrhoea? A normal stool is pretty firm, and you can pick it up easily with a baggie or scooper. “A stool that can be squished by the fingers or leaves a streak on the scooper is abnormal,” says Dr Cook. Now that we’ve got the clinical stuff out of the way, let’s get started learning about its causes, effects and everything in between.

Causes of diarrhoea in cats

Did you just change your cat’s diet without a transition period (mixing the old with the new food over the course of a few days)? If you feed your cat the same dry or canned food every day, then suddenly switch to a new brand, your cat’s system may become irritated, and diarrhoea is a possible result. Likewise, your cat might eat something that doesn’t settle well, which is called dietary indiscretion and a very common cause of diarrhoea.

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Diarrhoea also has more infectious causes, which predominantly affect younger cats and those in shelters. If there is an infectious cause of diarrhoea, like parasites, it can spread rapidly among a group of kittens. Parasites like roundworms and coccidia are easy to diagnose and treat, unlike serious contagious diseases, like Feline Infectious Peritonitis, which often prove more difficult.

Dr Cook says that less common causes of diarrhoea include a complex condition called chronic enteropathy, where the GI tract gets inflamed, but vets can’t find a cause. If your kitty has this condition, your vet might recommend a diet with limited antigens or hydrolysed proteins. Antibiotics or steroids also might help. If you have a senior cat with diarrhoea, it could be a symptom of small cell lymphoma, which is a diffuse low-grade cancer of the bowel. But don’t worry: a simple cause, like a dietary trigger, is the most likely one in cases of feline diarrhoea.

How to treat cat diarrhoea

First of all, if you have a multi-cat household, you may not know which kitty has the runs and has made the mess in the litter box. Besides observing the litter box traffic, you might need to keep your cats in separate rooms until you identify which cat has diarrhoea. But if one of your cats is losing weight or is showing a reduced appetite, they’re probably the one with the problem.

When is it time to see your vet? There’s no need to rush to a clinic in many cases, Dr Cook explains. So long as your cat is eating normally and otherwise well, she recommends waiting two to three days before seeing your vet; the diarrhoea is probably a transient digestive upset. However, if your cat seems ill in addition to the diarrhoea, especially if your cat isn’t eating or is an adolescent, seek prompt veterinary care, Dr Cook recommends.

Forget finding a cheap, simple remedy at a pet store, she says. “There really aren’t any useful over-the-counter options, and some of the things that people take for diarrhoea are actually harmful to cats,” says Dr Cook. It is also important to note that even if you’re spared the unpleasant experience of diarrhoea, your cat can still have a serious GI tract disease with signs from the other end. The most common symptoms would be vomiting, a loss of appetite and weight loss.

How to prevent cat diarrhoea

Can we prevent our kitties from getting diarrhoea, and spare both human and animal the misery? In many cases, yes. If you have a kitten, make sure you get routine deworming treatments, and any additional long-term preventatives your vet recommends. Select a high-quality diet that is high in protein for your cat, and feed this food consistently, she says. According to Dr Cook, “Keeping your cat indoors also reduces the risk of it picking up an infection or eating something foolish.”