Cats and pills

Compounding Pharmacy

Pill Pockets

How to Give Your Cat a Pill

• Find someplace where you can place the cat about the same level as your elbows – a countertop or table, perhaps a couch with you kneeling on the floor.
• Get the pill ready and go find cat. Pet cat.
• Pick up pill with thumb and middle finger of right hand.
• Place palm of left hand on cat’s head and gently grasp with fingers and thumb. Use index finger of right hand to gently begin opening cat’s lower jaw. Now, in one smooth sequence, tilt the head back and pull the lower jaw down.
• When the throat is almost vertical, drop the pill as far back in the throat as possible, poke it gently with your right index finger and release cat.
• Gently pet cat. The pill is either down or it isn’t – no point in stroking throat or holding mouth closed.
• For most cats you will need a helper. Ask the helper to stand or kneel behind the cat and gently restrain the elbows.
• Some cats are simply impossible to pill. You have two alternatives:

Compounding Pharmacy

By adding flavors, compounding pharmacists are able to make most drugs taste good enough that many cats will eat them voluntarily. Alternatively, some drugs can be administered by application to your cat’s skin. This transdermal route tends to be much less effective than oral administration.

Pill Pockets

Pill pockets are soft cup-shaped kitty treats – drop a pill into the open cup and seal it by gently squeezing the open end. Cat now happily eats Pill Pocket. Will every cat eat Pill Pockets? No, but many cats do – even some fussy cats. If you are having a tough time, it's certainly worth at try. 

Pill Pockets are useful even when you cat won't eat them voluntarily.  Especially when you are giving only half or a quarter of a pill, first cover it with pill pocket dough. Soft round good-tasting pills are much more readily accepted than scratchy bad-tasting pills. The soft slightly greasy Pill Pocket coating also makes pills slide down the esophagus more easily. Typically, dry pills hang up in a cat's esophagus for about ten minutes before finally reaching the stomach.  That can't be comfortable and with irritating drugs like doxycycline, can be harmful. 

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