Health

Root canal treatment for cats might sound far-fetched, but they’re performed at university hospitals and specialty practices around the country to save damaged and diseased teeth that might otherwise be extracted. In fact, newly available techniques and equipment in veterinary medicine have advanced the field of endodontics — the study and treatment of dental pulp — to the point where root canal treatment success rates in pets equal those in humans.

A reverse sneeze looks alarming. The cat may stand still with his elbows out and eyes open wide while rapidly snorting inward and extending his neck. An owner might panic, thinking the cat is suffocating.

Cats can harbor a variety of zoonotic diseases — those that can be transmitted to people. Some of the diseases are rare, while others are quite common. Although we are aware of many of these diseases, more continue to be discovered, thanks to improvements in technology and to the dedicated work of researchers in both the human medical and veterinary fields.

Cats and people suffer many of the same illnesses, a common one being urinary tract infections (UTIs). In women, they may account for more than 6 million visits to doctors in the United States each year. Similarly, Veterinary Pet Insurance reports that urinary bladder infections — the urinary bladder is part of the urinary tract — were the most common medical condition affecting cats in claims it processed in 2012.

A reverse sneeze looks alarming. The cat may stand still with his elbows out and eyes open wide while rapidly snorting inward and extending his neck. An owner might panic, thinking the cat is suffocating.

Feline infectious peritonitis ranks as one of the deadliest diseases affecting cats — it’s the leading cause of death in cats under 2 years of age. Veterinary scientists have long suspected that the FIP virus (FIPV) was a lethal mutation of the feline coronavirus (FECV), a benign and common intestinal virus, but they couldn’t identify how this transformation occurred. Until now.

Arthritis creeps up on a cat with signs so subtle that they’re easy to miss: getting up more slowly from a nap, dashing after a toy mouse less often, perhaps even losing interest in leaping from the floor to the kitchen counter top.

Congestive heart failure, characterized by the accumulation of fluid in the lungs and other body tissues secondary to heart disease, might appear to strike suddenly. In many cases, however, it results from a progressive underlying disease that, if detected early, can be managed to improve and extend a cat’s life.“Very often, we can help pets,” says cardiologist Bruce G. Kornreich, DVM, Ph.D., Associate Director for Education and Outreach at the Feline Health Center at the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine. “There are medications that can decrease congestion in lungs, may decrease the likelihood of an animal developing blood clots and can improve oxygenation of the blood.

Scientists at the Bauer Research Foundation in Vero Beach, Fla., are evaluating whether a vitamin B12-based drug called nitrosylcobalamin (NO-Cbl) can be used to treat several types of feline cancer.

Chances are that your cat will face a surgical procedure at least once during his lifetime if he hasn’t already. Happily, the nature of veterinary surgery is changing, which may mean that your cat’s next encounter could differ considerably.

Cat bites don’t get as much media coverage — or as much scientific attention — as dog bites because they tend to occur inside the home. Moreover, people mistakenly assume that, because cats are small, they can’t do much damage. In fact, puncture wounds made by sharp feline teeth are not only painful, they can lead to serious infections. It’s important to learn how to avoid them. Although cats sometimes appear to attack out of the blue, they always have their reasons, says Katherine A. Houpt, VMD, Ph.D., emeritus professor at the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine and diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Behaviorists. “Fear, predatory aggression, and pain top the list.

The results of studies on the life expectancy of cats with diabetes mellitus have varied widely. Now research among several European veterinary colleges, including the University of Zurich, has found cats with the disease have fair to good prospects for survival. The retrospective study of 114 cases, reported in the Journal of the American Veterinary Association, showed the median survival time of cats newly diagnosed with the disease was one year and 46 days, while 70 percent lived longer than three months, 64 percent lived longer than six months and 46 percent lived two years.