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“My cat vomits one to two times weekly. Is this normal? It is mostly hairballs.”
We hear this question all the time. Honestly, think to yourself if you were vomiting one to two times weekly would this be normal? So you know that the answer is no. The scientific word for hairballs is trichobezoars.
Granted most of us do not groom ourselves the way our feline friends do. Still, as carnivores they did evolve to move things through their gastrointestinal tract fast.
When you are a carnivore, there is very little digestion. Herbivores on the other hand spend lots of time digesting their food. For cats, their food moves through their gastrointestinal tract very quickly.
For kittens, parasites are the most common cause of vomiting. Deworming is one of the easiest therapies to try. Deworming should be done even if the fecal test is negative. There can be false negative results and deworming is safe. For older cats, this is a good place to start but there are more causes for vomiting in older cats. For older cats, sometimes changing diet can be helpful.
If vomiting continues, the veterinarian may want to consider blood work. Sometimes imaging such as x-rays or ultrasound can be helpful in determining the cause.
But wait, it is just hairballs. Some veterinarians feel that the gastrointestinal issues are the cause of the hairballs. Does this feel like the classic “which came first the chicken or the egg?”
It is a subject to debate, but a new study has shown that vomiting cats that do not have parasites or an internal medicine issue probably have inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).
There are a few blood tests that can be helpful in treatments, but definite diagnosis often involves biopsies of the intestine.
If your cat vomits frequently, this is maybe something to discuss with your veterinarian.
To learn more about IBD click the following link
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