For those with cats on Creon... do you sprinkle?

[Olesia711]

So sorry River's human companion... i was off line early last night so i did not see this post.

My goodness, River is GORGEOUS!!!!! (your avatar pIc) WOW!!!!

Yes, you are correct, there is no easy way to really figure out the pH of River's stomach... and no...i agree with you don't try to stick a pH strip down anywhere.... and it very likely will not reflect the actual pH down the digestive track (or this is what i am assuming). ANyway... don't bother with the strips.....

WOW.... you are really trying everything, aren't you.. that food mixture is something....

so you fed him a light dinner at 10:30 last night and this morning you still had to coax him to eat... i was hoping with a light dinner, that maybe you'd have better luck. But at least his poo elimination looked better.... BUT.... that really depends on his digestive transit time. (which can also change over time if the gut flora improves or worsens. Anyway... with dogs we feed them a little bit of a chopped up raw carrot in one meal and look for little piece of raw carrot to show up in the poo... this is how we determine how many hours after a meal the dog's digestive transit time is (during a specific period). BUT.... we do it this way because we know dogs can eat carrots, but that they don't readily digest them. I am not sure what food cats can eat safely but yet don't readily digest ..so that you can use to figure out the transit time.... if you know maybe you can try this "transit trick"

To avoid River getting distracted during mealtimes... can you feed him in a quiet place (like the bathroom or a closet)???? maybe that would eliminate 1 stressor....

Fingers and paws crossed that by sprinkling the CREON.... you will see repeated better colored poos. If this happens...it tells me that something about your timing of giving the whole pill was not optimal. SO... if the poos are repeatedly better on sprinkled CREON... BUT... you need to go back to giving the whole pill for whatever reason.... then (1) start keeping records or which poo is better, when giving the CREON whole at the beginning of a meal, (2) mid meal (3) end of meal (4) 3 to 4 minutes after a meal (5) and if you can guarantee that River will eat a meal then you can also try giving the CREON whole about 3 to 4 minutes prior to a meal .

THe other option (if you think this will work with River) is to sprinkle the CREON onto a tablespoon or so of something highly yummy and moist and only serve that 1st.... once River is done with that, then serve him the rest of the food as is. This might remove the possible "distraction" stress and often with these pets, if you psych them out with initially serving them a drop of food...they kind of freak out and gobble the rest readily when you finally give them the rest of their food...

Please continue to keep us posted on Mr. Gorgeous River!!!!!!!!!

[ecruteak]

No worries Olesia! Certainly no rush to reply, I check back here every day or so, so no worries at all

Last night I brought forward River's last 2 meals of the day (was working from home)-- instead of 7.30pm and 10.30pm, I went for about 5.30pm and 9.30pm. This morning he didn't wake us for his breakfast by meowing SUPER LOUDLY (which he's done in the past when really hungry), but he did eat all of it at once, so maybe 9.30pm is the latest we should go for supper. Maybe on days when we only get home close to 8pm we might not give a supper since he'd eat his second meal pretty late.

Anyhoooos yesterday he ate a total of 462 calories across 3 meals, one Creon 10000 with each. I'd been toying with the idea of upping his Creon dosage per meal, but I don't think that's recommended if one takes his current weight into account (correct me if I'm wrong?) -- Google seems to say the maximum Creon dosage is 2,500 per kg per meal, and he's sitting at around 4.4kg, which means his limit per meal is 10000. But I do wonder if he might absorb more out of each meal if the dose were slightly higher. Do you think increasing his dose would be appropriate at all or should I completely shelf that idea?

And yes, we do feed him in... well, we live in a pretty small apartment so there's not much choice for feeding spots (and when baby cries you can hear it everywhere) but we usually put his bowl in one of the quieter spots in the living room.

Thanks for the idea on poop recording -- so I made this pretty detailed spreadsheet yesterday to track (1) his calories (when you input the proportions of food the formula automatically calculates total calories), (2) whether the Creon was sprinkled or pilled for each meal, and (3) his daily weight. Might try to figure out how to put a poop tracker in there too, although I may just log that separately on my vet app so my phone isn't clogged with poop pics... this morning his poop wasn't too bad either! Pretty formed and fairly solidish (but not alarmingly so), color wasn't super dark (not as dark as yesterday's) but I've seen much lighter from him so /shrugs

And thank you and Jill for your kind compliments on River! He is such a handsome boy (if I do say so myself ^^;;) but ahhh, the medical issues indeed. He's our first cat to be honest, and after all of this, I don't know if I'd ever have another... here is a better pic of him showing off his pretty big blue eyes!

[Olesia711]

Oh MY!!!! Thanks for posting a larger picture of River.... He is stunning. About 35 years ago i had a female cat looked just like him, her name was Madonna. When we had to let Madonna go, the vet felt so bad that he shut his office (small town/very small ofc) down for the rest of the day.

Those CREON recommendations are (i am guessing if you got it off Dr. Google) for human children/babies..... which typically is a pretty good "rule of thumb" to use as a guideline for dosage. HOWEVER...because CREON is designed for humans, not dogs or cats, the pH values are different so we have to "play" around with how we give the CREON and when we give the CREON... so that we can figure out what technique works appropriately.

Where i am going with this long-winded explanation is that River may not yet be getting the full benefit of the right dose of CREON you are giving him... so yes...try giving a a few more pellets.... and record if it improves things or makes things worse. When trying to figure out a dose.... i always like to be rather conservative.... SO..... may try giving just 1/16 of a capsule more and see if that makes a difference.... if yes, but not perfect... then try 1/8 more. If the poos are sloppier, then don't increase any more....

Glad the new "timing" appears to have worked better than the 10:30 time.

ANd YES!!! OMG.. keeping an EPI log .... and tracking the results of the changes is often an eye-opener. to record the poo, maybe just take 1 poo pic to correspond with the change to see if it helped or hindered. Or just track Color, Volume, Texture, Frequency.

[DocX]

My go-to to get something into my cats when they were feeling bad was "the water that you drain off a can of tuna that is packed in water."

[ecruteak]

Just leaving a note here to remind myself (and to update as well!) -- last night (i.e. Friday night), supper was given at 9.30pm, I pilled the Creon because the supper was made purely of air-dried food and I didn't add water so there was nothing moist for the Creon to stick to...

Today (Saturday) his morning poop was great, but the evening poop could've been better I suppose. Half of it looked fairly alright but some parts of it were a little squishier than I'd like. Not sure if it's cause of the pilled supper Creon, more observation will be needed. I've made a note of it in his spreadsheet as well (yesss an EPI log is great, why didn't I think of this earlier!) and we'll see how the next few days go!

He got his weekly B12 shot today as well, what an absolute champ. <3

[jilbert57]

Wow your kitty is a stunner
You are doing a great job. Very nice deal on the spreadsheet and journal. It helps to record things.

Jill

[Olesia711]

Huge KUDOS to you!!!!!!!!!! you are doing such a great job with River.... and keeping an EPI log is excellent.

How our EPI pets react to something given or a change in the process.... at the time we "think" we are going to remember all the details..... but it doesn't take long before we forget... so keeping a log is VERY telling.

After a while you will start to notice "trends" of what works and what doesn't that will give you a clue as to what works with River and what doesn't.

Please continue to keep us posted!

[ecruteak]

Oops, this morning’s poop … wasn’t stodgy per se but quite gooey, not great! I suspect it might have been the extra Creon he got sprinkled on his dinner last night, or the guar gum that is in his squeeze treat that we use to pill his liver supplement and distract him during his B12 weekly injection. The road plan ahead for this week is to revert to just one Creon 10000 pill per meal, try using something else to pill the supplement, and his next B12 injection is only due in a week so we have some buffer time to see if the poops go back to normal.

Mini poopy update over

[Chance]

Creon doses can't really be estimated as easily, as there's several factors to consider, besides size of meals or amount of food per meal. For instance, fat content of the food might play a factor, as well as PH of the stomach - which is impossible to know exactly. Having said that, my guess is that 10,000 units per meal is enough for a small cat. But if fat content of food is very high, then I may be wrong.

As I've mentioned before, I have exactly the same results with pilling vs sprinkling. You're mileage may vary, but with 2 dogs, either way has yielded the same results, and same dose either way.

If you are still experimenting with doses, and sprinkling vs pilling, I suggest you start keeping your empty capsules (when you do sprinkle). If you do decide to try increasing the dose, or if you give treats away from meals, it's very handy to have partial pills ready. For example, if you did think that increasing was needed, an extra quarter capsule is probably your next step. Quarter capsule might be handy for treats too. If you keep your empties, it's quite easy to divide pills. I keep my empties for that reason as well. I give 1 and a half Creon 25,000 per meal to my Lab. So it's nice having half capsules ready to go. Or if we do give treats, I might give half or quarter capsule, depending on the amount of treats.

Have you tried probiotics at all? This might also help a fair bit. Problem is, it can be trial and error finding the right probiotic for River. Everyone is different! But it is something that is needed here. I do get reminded rather quickly if I have forgotten the probiotics for a couple of days.

Whatever you try, keeping your log will help, especially if you only make one change at a time. I've found it's darn near impossible to remember all the variables, about what was fed when, what supplements were given, what poops looked like when, etc. And if River were to get into something different, make note of that as well.

Keep us posted!