Cats can suffer from diseases that have a high mortality rate or are quite serious if they are not diagnosed and treated in time, especially when they are very young, very old or immunosuppressed. Many of these diseases are infectious and can be prevented with a proper vaccination plan, while others can be diagnosed early with routine check-ups at the veterinary center, so preventive medicine is crucial to prevent the most deadly diseases in cats.
Continue reading this article on our site to learn about the most deadly diseases in domestic cats and stray cats: cancer, leukemia feline immunodeficiency, feline rhinotracheitis, kidney disease, feline infectious peritonitis, and rabies.
Cancer
Cancer is not only a disease with high mortality, but it is also one of the most common cat diseases. Cancer, or uncontrolled cell overgrowth due to a genetic mutation of one or several cell types in a specific location, can be truly deadly, especially those types of cancer with the ability to spread through the bloodstream to other neighboring organs such as the lung, kidney, or bone (metastasis). The Flint Animal Cancer Center states that 1 in 5 cats will develop cancer during their lifetime, especially when they are older.
In cats, the most frequent tumors are lymphomas, associated or not with the feline leukemia virus, as well as squamous cell carcinoma, breast cancer, intestinal adenocarcinoma, sarcoma of soft tissue, osteosarcoma and mastocytoma.
Treatment
Treatment of cancer in cats will depend on the type in question and whether or not distant metastases have occurred. In resectable tumors, treatment will be complete surgical removal together with or without chemotherapy.
If metastasis has not yet occurred, the best option is chemotherapy using specific cytotoxic drugs for each cancer. For feline lymphoma, there are several protocols that combine drugs of this type to kill rapidly dividing tumor cells, such as the CHOP protocol or the COP. In other cancers, such as squamous cell carcinoma, cryosurgery may be used, while in others the use of radiotherapyor electrochemotherapy can also improve the life expectancy of the affected cat.
If there are metastases and the cancer is already very advanced, the prognosis is very poor and many cats will not withstand chemotherapy because they are especially weak and have organ involvement, so only acould be established symptomatic treatment to try to improve your quality of life.
Feline leukemia
Feline leukemia is an infectious disease caused by a retrovirus, the feline leukemia virus, which has the ability to integrate into the feline cell genome, remaining dormant and without causing symptoms to the cat for a long time.
However, under certain conditions, the virus can be reactivated causing clinical signs in the cat derived from immunosuppression, reproductive signs, hematological signs, tumors (lymphomas and leukemias), immune-mediated diseases and cell alterations of the hematopoietic system, while in others, after infection, an acute form is produced that can kill the cat quickly, especially those under 5 years of age.
Treatment
Feline leukemia therapy seeks to maintain the cat with a good quality of life and manage immunosuppression and pathologies caused by the virus. Therefore, a symptomatic treatment should be performed with multivitamins, appetite stimulants or anabolic steroids, use antibiotics for a longer time if there are infections due to immunosuppression, perform transfusions of blood in severe anemia, increase the cat's defenses through antivirals and immunomodulators such as feline interferon omega (dose of 10⁶ IU/kg per day for 5 days), chemotherapy if there are tumors, corticosteroids in immune-mediated diseases and specific therapy for the rest of the pathologies that can occur.
Feline immunodeficiency
Another deadly disease in stray and domestic cats because it is highly infectious is feline immunodeficiency. It is caused by a lentivirus that is spread after very close contact through blood and saliva, through bites and wounds, being especially frequent among stray cats due to to fights over females or territories.
After infection, the virus produces a viremia (virus in the blood) that produces an immune response in the cat, after which it passes into a subclinical phase that can last for years, but whichprogressively destroys the cat's CD4+ T lymphocytes until levels reach a minimum, at which point acquired immunodeficiency syndrome or AIDS occurs, making the cat very susceptible to infections and immune-mediated oral and respiratory diseases and greatly increasing mortality rates.
Treatment
As occurs with the leukemia virus, there is also no specific drug against this virus, the goal of treatment being to stabilize the cat, maintain a good quality of life and correctly manage the complications and consequences of immunosuppression.
The use of recombinant feline interferon omega may also be useful for its immunomodulatory and antiviral properties, as well as the use of vitamin complexes that include evening primrose oil. Secondary infections should be controlled promptly with antibiotic therapy, which is often prolonged due to immunosuppression.
Feline Rhinotracheitis
Feline rhinotracheitis is caused by feline herpesvirus type I (FHV-1), a microorganism that has the ability to maintain latent within the cells of the infected cat and is spread by secretions between cats, contaminated objects such as clothing or hands.
Generally, it produces an upper respiratory condition, with nasal discharge, sneezing, rhinitis, fever, conjunctivitis, keratitis, corneal ulcers, protrusion of the third eyelid and corneal sequestrations that are not fatal in immunocompetent individuals. However, young kittens are particularly vulnerable, where the virus can cause pneumonia with severe viremia leading to sudden death.
Treatment
Feline herpesvirus therapy is based on the use of antivirals, the most effective being famciclovir at a dose of 40 mg/ kg for three weeks, being higher (62.5 mg/kg) in kittens and cats with kidney disease.
When corneal ulcers are present, tobramycin should be used as a topical broad-spectrum antibiotic, a triple ocular antibiotic, or more selective antibiotics for infected ulcers or complicated. When ulcerative keratitis is chronic and corneal sequestration has occurred, corneal surgery should be performed. Anti-inflammatories and L-lysine can also be given to inhibit arginine, necessary for virus replication, although the most recent studies cast doubt on their efficacy.
Renal disease
Kidney disease is another deadly disease in cats, with chronic disease being especially common in cats over 7 years of age and acute disease in young cats. It occurs after poisoning, dehydration, infections or various diseases. The loss to a greater or lesser degree of renal filtration capacity is very serious, since the toxins filtered by the kidney remain in the body, there is an increase in blood pressure and electrolyte imbalances, causing damage and associated clinical signs that can end the life of your little feline.
Treatment
The treatment of kidney disease will depend on whether it is an acute or chronic disease. Thus, the treatment of the acute form includes the following:
- Control dehydration with fluid therapy.
- Add calcium gluconate or sodium bicarbonate to control potassium.
- Control vomiting and nausea with antiemetics.
- Treat pyelonephritis (kidney infection) with antibiotics.
- Administering forced nutrition in anorexic cats.
- Perform peritoneal dialysis or hemodialysis in cases of serious impairment of renal function.
On the other hand, the treatment of chronic kidney disease should include the following therapy:
- Control of proteinuria with angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors (benazepril or enalapril).
- Restriction of phosphorus in the diet or use of phosphate binders and use of renal diet in advanced stages.
- Forced nutrition in anorexic cats.
- Treatment of hypertension with amlodipine.
- Potassium supplements in advanced stages and in cats with little phosphorus.
- Treatment of severe anemia with erythropoietin.
- Control of dehydration with fluid therapy.
Feline infectious peritonitis
Feline infectious peritonitis is, of the cat's infectious diseases, the deadliest and the one with the worst prognosis It is a disease fatal in almost all cases and without effective marketed treatment. It is caused by the feline enteric coronavirus when it mutates, which happens in around 20% of cats infected with this intestinal virus. When this mutation occurs, the virus does not remain only in the intestine, but also has the ability to infect macrophages and monocytes, which are cells of the immune system, and is distributed throughout the body.
Depending on the competence of the cat's cellular immune system, the disease may not occur, it may produce a dry form with the formation of pus granulomas in organs, compromising their good functionality, or a wet form, much more serious and rapid in which fluid effusions form in the abdominal and/or thoracic cavity of the affected cat.
Treatment
This virus has no treatment and the outcome is usually fatal, but symptomatic treatment should always be tried with a high-protein diet, use of proteolytic enzymes, vitamin complexes, drainage of effusions in wet FIP, use of corticosteroids to depress the humoral immune system and reduce vascular consequences, use of cellular system enhancers such as feline recombinant interferon omega or dexamethasone injection in cavities to prevent spillage.
In recent years, two active ingredients have been studied that seem to have a good chance of being an effective treatment for FIP: the 3C protease inhibitor GC376 and the nucleoside analog GS-441524, which seem to be the latter more promising. However, as we say, they are still being studied.
Rage
Although it is rare thanks to vaccination, the rabies virus is deadly to cats, it also has the ability to be one of the cat diseases transmissible to humans. Rabies is a very important deadly zoonosis for humanity and cats can suffer from it and transmit it to humans. The virus is transmitted from the saliva after the bite of an infected animal and goes to the central nervous system, causing flaccid paralysis due to a lower motor neuron syndrome that evolves into upper and cortex, causing encephalitis that ends up causing the death.
Treatment
All rabies infections end in death and in animals, including cats, treatment is prohibited, always performing a euthanasia, due to the great public he alth risk it poses as it has the power to transmit to humans and other animals.
As we see, these deadly diseases in cats often have no specific treatment, so preventive medicine becomes the best option to avoid them or, at least, diagnose them as soon as possible.
