Liver infections in cat.

Dr. Marie replied:

Oh, I am sorry to see that Issie is going through this.

Liver disease is one of the most frustrating things to deal with. I have several cases in my practice like this where we just don't know what is wrong.

Has Issie had a biopsy done of her liver? This could possibly give us some more insight as to what is going on. But, she would need an anesthetic and it can be expensive to do this.

Has your vet determined for sure that the jaundice is due to liver disease? Or is it possible that it is due to anemia? If there is something destroying her red blood cells then this can cause jaundice. When we have ongoing jaundice due to anemia then often steroids need to be given long term. Some animals can be changed to a medication called cyclosporin if they are having side effects from the steroids.

If your vet thinks that it is due to liver disease, then it is really really hard to say why. It is not likely to be viral. It may be something called cholangiohepatitis which is inflammation in the liver and bile duct. Some cats just get this and we don't know why.

If your vet does think it is due to liver disease you can ask him about a medication called sam-E. This product is really good at helping to support the liver.

I wish I could give you more information but it is really hard to know what to do in animals with liver disease even when we have all sorts of tests. It is very frustrating!

Dr. Marie.


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Dr. Marie replied:

The word you are looking for is "bilirubin". :) This is the pigment that causes a cat to be jaundiced. There are two main reasons for an increase in bilirubin. One is liver disease (because the bile duct gets compressed) and the other is if red blood cells get destroyed - then they release bilirubin.) It sounds like the first one is the cause of the increase in bilirubin for Issie.

It is really unlikely that there is anything you can do in her environment to help her. If this is due to bacteria, it's not due to her ingesting or taking in bacteria in any way.

I know how helpless you must feel...it is not fun battling with liver disease.

If your vet feels it is a good idea then I really think the biopsy is the best way to go. If we can find out why the liver is struggling it will really help us know what to do next!

Dr. Marie replied:

FIV can cause anemia...but this would be really obvious on bloodwork though. It is definitely possible to have a false positive FIV test or a false negative FIV test.

I understand what you're saying about the connection between appetite and liver...it can be a vicious cycle where a cat doesn't feel well and then doesn't eat and as a result the liver gets affected. This leads to a condition called fatty liver.

A biopsy of the liver should really tell us if we are dealing with fatty liver.

There are a number of other medicines that she could go on that may help. But personally,I would want to do the biopsy first to determine what is going on before I start throwing medicines at her. It's no fun giving medicines to cats!