My Poor Toothless Lad

[Ruth B]

Looks like Saturn will be virtually toothless from now on.

We noticed he had lost one of his canines over the weekend, it had been overgrown for a long time giving him a lob sided sabre tooth appearance, it wasn't bothering him but we decided to get it checked out anyway and got an appointment for Tuesday night. The vet decided the root was best coming out and in view of his chronic Gingivitis more work might be needed. It seems like a lot of work was needed in the end. The viral Gingivitis is probably responsible for all the molars having bad reabsorbative lesions on them and needing to come out, and the premolars and incisors were already gone or hanging by a thread so they have been sorted out and removed as well, he has been left with 3 canines, which might eventually have to come out as well.

Once the viral Gingivitis was diagnosed about 3 years ago, not long after we had him I knew that it was likely to come to this, but it does seem such a shame as he is less than 5 years old. I also find it surprising that he never seemed to have a problem eating, cooked or raw meat, wet or dried food, any number of treats, all disappeared quickly, the only symptom was his bad breath. Blue had all his molars out in the end and it didn't slow him down, so I doubt it will give Saturn much problem, particularly if a lot were already mostly gone, but I can't help but feel sorry for my little lad.

I just hope he either gives up hunting, or can gum them to death I really don't want to have to deal with a lot of live mice in the house.

[fjm]

He will probably feel much better for having them gone, but it will be interesting to see whether the mice start thumbing their noses at him!

[Ruth B]

He's home.

The idea was to keep him shut in the lounge at least until tomorrow to give him some recovery time, he has different ideas and is currently sprawled out in the bedroom doorway, one of his normal spots. Except from being extra fussy you wouldn't think he had anything done.

He is still staying in the lounge overnight if I have any say in the matter.

[alanc]

Poor old chap. Still, I'm sure I read somewhere that toothless old cats seem to survive quite happily. If he carries on hunting, maybe he will do as my old Honey did to the only mouse she ever killed and squash them flat (Honey was a bit portly)!

[Mollycat]

So ....... did you have any say in the matter of the lounge?

Poor Saturn. They are so resilient though. My old Sarah had no teeth at all behind her canines at the top and yet she came out of the carrier straight to the biscuit bowl and crunch crunch crunch. Ouch!

Just for anyone else noticing a long canine though, do get an early vet check. I lost my precious 14 year old Henry two years ago to a mouth tumour. These particular tumours require very aggressive invasive treatment so early is critical. Thankfully they are rare.

[Ruth B]

He did stay in the lounge over night, it is surprising what a bribe of a bowl of kitty milk can do, he also only really yelled to be let out when he could hear me moving about upstairs. He is currently curled up in the bedroom doorway fast asleep. He seems none the worse for it, and is eating well, which isn't really surprising, he has never had a problem eating and when I think what state his teeth must have been in for a while, and he did manage to find a bowl of crunchies and get his head in before i could stop him yesterday. Blue, one of our previous cats, had to have all his teeth out when he was about 13 years old, and the vet told us to keep him on wet food for a few days and even to add water to soften it further for him. The crunchies had been left down for our other cat while he was at the vets and we didn't think to take them up before we let him out of the carrier, he jumped out and was straight to the crunchy bowl, he never had a problem and always preferred dried food to wet.

We had noticed his canine was over long about 3 years ago and had the vet check it out, and then again every time he had his annual check, but it was always firm and they were reluctant to try and take it out as it has a very long root which can lead to complications. We now have to hope they have managed to get it all out, or that it will be reabsorbed anyway. He is back on Monday evening and again in a couple of months, when he might have to have an X ray just to check it.

I will say I was really pleased with the vets, he must have been on the operating table about 3 hours, and they rang me when they had cleaned all the teeth up and could see what state they were in, to check I was happy to have the molars removed, then again about two hours later to let me know they were still working on him, another call an hour later to say they had finished an were just bringing him round and that he just had the three canines left, and finally a nurse called later to say he was ready to pick up and make an appointment to collect him. The initial consultation and antibiotic injection was £60, and the rest, including an overnight stay and pre-op blood tests was £310, which was well towards the lower end of the estimate, when they phoned to say that all the molars need to come out I was expecting it to be far more than that.

[Germaine]

Please look into lactoferrin. It is a natural substance that's been studied scientifically. I have used it with great success in my 2 cats. I use 250 mg capsule contents mixed with a little water in a syringe and give it a little at a time into the side of their mouth until they have swallowed all of it. There is also a 2 times per day oral spray. Information on studies is found on the internet.

[Germaine]

I meant to say that I give a 250mg capsule mixed with water once per day then less often once symptoms are gone.

[Ruth B]

This poor toothless lad is not so poor after all, he has managed to bring me at least 3 mice and one that I think was a small rat (the tail looked too pink to be a large mouse) in the last couple of weeks. Fortunately all dead so he is still quite able to hunt and kill regardless of lacking teeth.

[Bbarb]

Aren't cats just amazing! Good for him.