How to Give Your Cat Medication

Giving your cat a pill or liquid medication can be a challenging part for the cat owners and sometimes for some experienced Veterinarians as well. Cats are like babies and we can’t just simply put those bitter pills directly in their mouth without any hesitation. It requires ample time and patience from the owner’s side to keep them stay calm and confident so that the whole process doesn’t become stressed and more anxious as a result. In today’s post, we are going to discuss some advance preparation to make cat medication experience more pleasant.

Giving Your Cat Medication

Before we proceed to give medications, I believe every cat owner should read all the directions and dosage information carefully printed on the prescription container. Follow the medication time cycle strictly and should consult with your Vet if a particular medicine is allowed to be given with cat food or not.

There are different types of cat medications ranging from deworming tablets to antibiotics but, we will generalize this into two categories as:

Pills

• To restrain or to get a proper grip over your cat’s movements, you should wrap your cat in a towel or some thick sheet in such a way that their paws are wrapped against their body and face is sticking out. These practices are specially designed for aggressive or scratchy cats.
• Now, use your non-dominant hand to hold their head so that your thumb and index finger fall just behind the long canines of the cat. Your dominant hand will be used to hold the pill.
• Tilt their head upward back in such a way that their nose starts pointing upward. Having face upward will help the pill to travel straight into their tummy without any interruption.
• Hold the pill in your dominant hand and using your forefinger, gently push down the lower jaw and his/her mouth will open fully.
• Now, drop the pill into the mouth and rub his throat gently to avoid spitting.
  As an alternate method, you can also use pill popper to get the pill into the back of your cat’s throat without having to risk getting bitten and sticking your fingers in there.
• When swallowed, release the cat and give some water to make sure the pill has gone all the way down into the stomach.

Liquid Medications

• The first step is the same for liquid medications as well to gain control over your cat’s movement.
• Make sure your cat’s head is not tilted backward to avoid choking due to inhalation of liquid into the windpipe.
• You can use a plastic eyedropper or dose syringe to flow the liquid medication into the cat’s mouth. Now, place the tip of the dropper or syringe into any one side of your cat’s mouth.
• Release the medication from the dropper and rub the cat’s throat lightly to stimulate the swallowing process.

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