# Addison has a fat lip! Eosinophilic Granuloma & Acne?



## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Well, two weeks after having taken Addison to the vet for a mysterious "injury" bald spot/scab on her rear leg (seemed to be due to a bite mark from wrestling with Franny)...she woke up this morning with a fat lip. :? 

Edit: It's the middle area of her bottom lip.

It doesn't seem to hurt her at all, she's still very playful and is biting her toys, Franny and ME when I tried to look at it. She was play biting though like she always does. She's also eating and drinking normally...

I don't think it's serious because she doesn't seem affected by it at all, but it is alarming and rather strange! I swear, this little kitten has had more ailments in 7 months than Franny has had in 5 years! In fact, Franny has never been sick, hurt, etc. EVER. 

Has anyone ever experienced this? 

Quick History: The two cats wrestle all day long and when Addison is not wrestling with Franny she is climbing high on things, playing in our christmas tree or leaping from one piece of furniture way far across to another. It's very possible she fell on something or smacked herself on something because she is fearless and she falls off of things all day long. 
Can a cat really get a fat lip though, or is this more likely to be a reaction to something or an infection? 

I DID buy a NEW canned food (natural balance) and she's only had it 2 times before this happened....Allergic reaction???

Don't worry, if it gets worse or it doesn't go away in a day or two, she'll be back to the vet, but I'm so paranoid I like to hear everyone's feedback here, particularly Dr. Jean...

Thanks!


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## coaster (Dec 1, 2004)

don't know what it is. it may be an injury; that should resolve in a few days, I would think. if it's an abcess, it'll need a vet visit for possible drainage and antibiotics. watching and waiting a few days would be what I'd do, to see if it gets better on its own or worse. you say there's no change in behavior or appetite, which is a good sign.

keep us posted.

oh, boy, I thought of the holidays coming up. that always throws a complication into it.

Tim


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

It wouldn't be my life if there wasn't something complicated about the situation! :roll: 

I hope it's not a tooth thing! She seems so young for that, but I guess you never know. She is eating and BITING as normal though! :wink:


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

One more thing...
Addison carries around these little fake mice ALL the time. However, after time they tend to get ripped up and torn apart. I find them and throw them away, but lately she has taken to putting this very same mouse inside her food dish. 

Every day I find the same mouse in her food dish and it's in bad shape! Could thes torn up little mice (plastic bodies under that fake fur) be spreading bacteria or causing an infection or something to form on her mouth. When you think about it, her bottom lip area is the area that these little mice are constantly hanging from her mouth...
Call me crazy, it's just a thought. I'm going to throw them all away - though she'll be very sad.


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## coaster (Dec 1, 2004)

addfran - your last msg reminded me of something I read a couple months ago: that in some cases cat acne can be caused by plastic food dishes. (that's why I bought porcelain dishes). your mention of the plastic inside the fabric reminded me. it seems pretty far-fetched, but I'm sure at this point you're trying to think of every possible cause, so I thought I'd throw it out for what it's worth. we'll see if it gets better when you take the toy away. 

Tim


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## Ducky (Nov 3, 2004)

Another message board I post on, a girl there, her cat had a fat lip too. It turned out to be cat acne. Does she have any sores on her chin? Or bald patches?

There is also something called a "rodent ulcer" which another cat owner on the same board found her cat had. That cat had no chin baldness or scabs, and the cat's lip basically looked like he had been punched & it was fat.

http://www.skinvet.com/diseasedetail.asp?index=10

The bottom link has some pictures that viewers might find to be hard to look at, so avoid this link if you do not like to look at semi-graphic pictures.

http://www.marvistavet.com/html/body_eo ... uloma.html


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## drjean (Jan 6, 2004)

My guess would be rodent ulcers, or Eosinophilic Granuloma Complex. The most common places for this to manifest are the backs of the thighs, and the lips. It is an auto-immune disease. So, no more vaccinations -- they will just make it worse! (This is true for any auto-immune or allergic disease) Your vet can make the diagnosis based on an impression smear; under the microscope, the presence of eosinophils (a type of white blood cell) is easy to check.

Conventional treatment is steroids, but I hate to condemn a cat to a lifetime of steroids except as a very last resort.

I've had good success using Vitamin E (100-200 IU per day) and BioSuperfood. http://www.littlebigcat.com/index.php?a ... uperhealth

You might also want to take a look at this article on allergies, since the same principles apply: http://www.littlebigcat.com/index.php?a ... giesincats

Cheers,
Dr. Jean


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Thank you both! 

Dr. Jean, When she had the mark and the baldness on the back of her leg, she was prescribed clavamox and literally within 2-3 days it was gone. Her fur is already growing back and everything. 

She DID have a very nasty reaction to one of her vaccinations, would this by a symptom of some type of autoimmune disease? What causes autoimmune responses. 

Also, one thing I wanted to mention was just this morning as I was getting ready for work, Addison took a running start from one end of the house to the other. She couldn't stop in time and she ran head first into the table. The little shelf at the bottom of the coffee table is just high enough so that it was a perfect slam of her face into it. She ended up hitting her nose. I know this because it was all red and when i was touching it to see if she was okay a little tiny bit of blood ended up on my finger. It was a little bit of watery blood that seemed to come out of the side of her nostril. 

Do you think maybe she also slammed herself into the table and bruised her lip this way too? Or are you still inclined to think it's a rodent ulcer or autoimmune issue? In any case, she's been put in my bedroom with her food/water and a littlerbox for the day - some quiet time, without Franny to wrestle with - and she can slam herself into my down comforter all day! :wink: 

There is no sore on the lip, but the swelling is less than it was yesterday and it's more red now. It does NOT seem to hurt her at all.


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Hmmm, and when she was at the Vet's office for her leg thingy a few weeks ago, she was given her Rabies shot....could that have triggered something?

Also, when I took her in for her leg, I asked the vet if it could be an allergy of some sort and she told me that at Addison's age it was very unlikely. Is this true? She's 7 months now.


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Double post - edited it to remove.


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Okay, well...I've ordered that Biosuperfood, started them both on Vitamin E and I just bought some Venison cat food. 

Addison's lip is not nearly as red as it was last night or even this morning. The swelling has gone down enough to be able to see the defined lip line again, but there's no doubt that it's still there. I found her chasing the most disgusting bug last night too. Apparently they are very common in Chicago in older apartments and you only see them "once in a while" according to the people I work with. Once in a lifetime is enough for me, but I wonder if she got bit by one of these little suckers. I guess they are milipedes or something, the peopel here call them "1,000 leggers". YUCK!

edited: typos


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## BoscosMum (Apr 29, 2004)

AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

I have seen those millipedes, centipedes whatever they are.
They make my skin crawl! We had some in our basement.
I about FREAKED! Now I vacuum down there *alot*!


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

They are positively disgusting. The thought of these things being in our building makes my skin crawl. 

Apparently they do come from the basement - or so I've been told. We have a closet in the middle of our apartment that has a small piece of the baseboard chipped off, I wonder if they climb in through there! 

EW! Do they bite??


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## coaster (Dec 1, 2004)

are they the squishy ones that when you squash half the other half keeps going? kind of a light color, not the dark brown ones. they don't bite. I had quite a few of those in the basement of a house I rented some years ago. I just kept killing them when I found them and eventually they were all gone.

Tim


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

This is what she was going after:

Yucky Bug Picture-Click Here


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## Ducky (Nov 3, 2004)

centipedes have fangs & venom to kill their prey (some can even kill animals as large as a mouse). But Millipedes do not have fangs.
I don't know how likely it was that she was bit on the lip by a centipede, but I have heard stranger things.


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## coaster (Dec 1, 2004)

yes, those are the ones I had. don't worry, they don't bite, they're just disgusting.

Tim


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Icck! They are so disgusting. 

Her lip is almost back to normal now. The swelling is almost completely gone. 

Very strange!


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

*UPDATED*

Updated: 1/2/05 - *It IS Eosinophilic Granuloma*

Okay, well the lip swelling is LONG gone, though in my opinion her lip is not perfectly the same. I don't know if the color is a little bit off or what, but something just doesn't look right to me. 

The mark on her leg from a month ago is back. We originally thought it was a bite or scratch mark, and had treated it as such. Addison was originally treated with Clavmox Oral Antibiotics and Animax Cream, which seemed to do the trick, though I'm not sure why. Hmm, maybe the antibiotics trigger something in the body to stop attacking itself??

We are fairly sure it is Eosinophilic Granuloma (the linear type...I've been doing a lot of research and there appears to be 3 types of Eosinophilic complex). We were at the Vets office again with the puppy on Thursday and we told her about Addison's lip and she immediately suggested it may be EG. Since that's what Dr. Jean mentioned on this thread as well. After looking up all the information I can over the internet, I found out that EG happens to show up on the back of the thigh area and the lower lip producing a pouty appearance. This is exactly what Addison has had in the last month. 3 Bouts of it, the first on the leg, next on the lip and now again on the leg. 

She doesn't appear to be in any pain at all and everything I've looked up says that these are NOT painful. We switched her food to Venison and Pea - dry and Venison and Rice - canned. She has started on her Biosuperfood and Vitamin E. I have also considered giving her L-Lysine as I have come across a few forums where others have posted about their cats with EG having good response to L-Lysine. I am aware that this is normally a good supplement for cats with Herpes but for some reason it's been effective for this as well. Does anyone here have any experience with this?

*Dr. Jean*, we opted not to do further testing at this time because this seems like a classic case according to my vet, plus we had done some cultures that all came back negative during the first bout with her leg.Our vet did suggest some steroid shots if the lesions don't disappear or seem to become bothersome to Addison. I am holding off to see if these supplements help and if the diet change is helpful at all. The more I read about this problem it seems that flea bites are the most common allergic trigger, but we live in an apartment with hardwood floors and I'm in Chicago - there aren't any fleas out here this time of year. 

Any suggestions? Have I missed anything? 

Since I prefer to avoid steroid treatment if possible, is there anything else I can do to help Addison? 

Is EG something that is more common in cats with more serious health problems or can it also strike a typically healthy cat?

Lastly, I noticed that this seems to be triggered by hormones if that's possible. Addison is 7 months and has her vet appointment for January 11th to be spayed, this whole thing has started about a month ago which was a week or so after the first time she came into heat. Two weeks later, another heat cycle and suddenly a fat lip. Coincidence??


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## spittles (Oct 24, 2003)

Just a little something you missed  

NEVER feed dry food when you are using BSF. Dr. Jean told me that dry food is too hard on the system along with BSF. So she had me change my cat to all-wet before I started it.

Take Care,
Abhay


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Wow, thank you! I had no idea. 
She's been eating more wet food than dry lately anyway, so the tapering off should be easy. The other cat is much more picky, so that'll be a challenge, but I've been trying to feed them seperately anyway since Addison's food has all this stuff in it now! 8O


Abhay, did the BSF help your cat?


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## spittles (Oct 24, 2003)

YES, BSF works wonderful for my older , Tulsi. Tulsi got huge open sores that she licked(which just made them worse) and my vet wanted to keep her on steriod shots for the rest of her life. We didn't want that, so I asked Dr. Jean about the BSF, and now her sores are all better! They left and have never came back!

Take Care!
Abhay


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Well that's encouraging news. I'm glad I bought two bottles! 
I'm so happy to hear that about your cat. Glad she's doing better! And, good for you for not doing the steroid shots and having a positive outcome!


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Grrr. 
Last night I got distracted or I would have posted about how the area on Addison's leg cleared up again and how her lip finally looked the way it should. 
Came home from the store today and noticed her lip looked a little lopsided. Picked her up and looked and one side is starting to look a wee bit red and a little puffy. 
:roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll:


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

*And the Saga continues*

I'm not sure if this is related or not, but it appears that the puffyness I noticed yesterday may be kitty acne. Today she has a black line of connected dots along the bottom of her upper lip. 

Any suggestions? 

I had been using mostly glass bowls, but just went out and bought 4 stainless steel ones so that I can alternate between them when I'm washing two at a time. 

I feel bad for her. Heck, I feel bad for me too. This is discouraging and stressful.


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

*MORE, MORE and MORE*

Hmm, just went BACK to the petstore YET AGAIN to exchange my stainless bowls for ceramic. I read another post that said brushed aluminum was no good, so I was unsure of stainless, exchanged them just to be safe. 

Oh, and it cost me $7.25 to PARK my car in the garage attached to our PetsMart, they don't validate parking on weekends. That is one thing I HATE about living in the city.

AND: my suspicions about this whole thing with Addison being realted to hormones are increasing dramatically. She is now doing the chirping noise constantly, rubbing on everything that she can touch including her face across the rug (hmm....chin acne...??) and doing that walking in place thing. She's in heat yet again. This is like every 2 weeks. Her appointment is on Tuesday. Thank goodness!


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## spittles (Oct 24, 2003)

Those black specks sound like Feline Ache to me. Dr. Jean has an article on it...

http://littlebigcat.com/index.php?actio ... felineacne

Good luck!
Abhay


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## AddFran (Jul 10, 2004)

Thanks, Abhay. That was helpful. 
Dr. Jean also mentions in her article that EG can mimic cat acne too. So, I wonder if that's what the problem really is. Sheesh. This is tiring and frustrating.


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