Any vets? Cat tail shut in door :(
Discussion
Unfortunatley the missus shut our 14 week old kittens tail in the door on friday.
The tip (roughly) 0.5cm has been "amputated" by this. The cat has gone to the vets and has had the tail glued, is happy as larry and with no ill effects.
Eating, drinking and tearing the other kitten apart is all OK
But when the tail was shut in around a 5cm thread like length came off with it. Now I cannot be sure if this was nerve damage or anything else.
The vet didnt actually answer my question so it is more out of curiosity. The "thread" did not look like it contained blood.
Secondly the tail has been glued together and as such looks like it is healing ok but I am not a qualified vet so do not know how long something like this will take to heal - its a small bit at the end. But she has a hood on but can still lick and bite the tail with no ill effect to her hearts content.
She has a checkup tonight but I was after more of a second opinion.
Thanks Guys.
The tip (roughly) 0.5cm has been "amputated" by this. The cat has gone to the vets and has had the tail glued, is happy as larry and with no ill effects.
Eating, drinking and tearing the other kitten apart is all OK
But when the tail was shut in around a 5cm thread like length came off with it. Now I cannot be sure if this was nerve damage or anything else.
The vet didnt actually answer my question so it is more out of curiosity. The "thread" did not look like it contained blood.
Secondly the tail has been glued together and as such looks like it is healing ok but I am not a qualified vet so do not know how long something like this will take to heal - its a small bit at the end. But she has a hood on but can still lick and bite the tail with no ill effect to her hearts content.
She has a checkup tonight but I was after more of a second opinion.
Thanks Guys.
Hi scott vet student here.
First of all i would get the vet to give you another collar as she shouldnt be chewing and licking it mainly as this will slow the healing process and also could introduce infection to the wound.
Secondly this 5cm long 'thread' you mention does sound odd as there are no major blood vessels at the tip of the tail and no major nerves so something so long and visable does sound a bit strange. One way to test for nerve damage is simply to wait for the kitten to be facing away from you and touch her tail and see if she responds. If you still have the 'thread' you could show the vet at the checkup and see what they say.
Young animals heal quickly so i think as long as she is not allowed to chew and lick the wound it should heal quickly.
Hope this helps and i wish you the best of luck
First of all i would get the vet to give you another collar as she shouldnt be chewing and licking it mainly as this will slow the healing process and also could introduce infection to the wound.
Secondly this 5cm long 'thread' you mention does sound odd as there are no major blood vessels at the tip of the tail and no major nerves so something so long and visable does sound a bit strange. One way to test for nerve damage is simply to wait for the kitten to be facing away from you and touch her tail and see if she responds. If you still have the 'thread' you could show the vet at the checkup and see what they say.
Young animals heal quickly so i think as long as she is not allowed to chew and lick the wound it should heal quickly.
Hope this helps and i wish you the best of luck
swiftwill said:
Hi scott vet student here.
First of all i would get the vet to give you another collar as she shouldnt be chewing and licking it mainly as this will slow the healing process and also could introduce infection to the wound.
Secondly this 5cm long 'thread' you mention does sound odd as there are no major blood vessels at the tip of the tail and no major nerves so something so long and visable does sound a bit strange. One way to test for nerve damage is simply to wait for the kitten to be facing away from you and touch her tail and see if she responds. If you still have the 'thread' you could show the vet at the checkup and see what they say.
Young animals heal quickly so i think as long as she is not allowed to chew and lick the wound it should heal quickly.
Hope this helps and i wish you the best of luck
Thank you very much. Really appreciate the info. The vet did look at the thread but did not give me any feedback on it. There is definitely no nerve damage as she is well aware when we stroke the tail etc.First of all i would get the vet to give you another collar as she shouldnt be chewing and licking it mainly as this will slow the healing process and also could introduce infection to the wound.
Secondly this 5cm long 'thread' you mention does sound odd as there are no major blood vessels at the tip of the tail and no major nerves so something so long and visable does sound a bit strange. One way to test for nerve damage is simply to wait for the kitten to be facing away from you and touch her tail and see if she responds. If you still have the 'thread' you could show the vet at the checkup and see what they say.
Young animals heal quickly so i think as long as she is not allowed to chew and lick the wound it should heal quickly.
Hope this helps and i wish you the best of luck
I don't think a bigger collar is even available as the one she has she gets stuck in when she walks and is very large for her. Either she has a very long tail or is an extremely flexible kitten.
Maybe you could also let me know when they will stop waking me up at 5am
digimeistter said:
Happened to my Cat, one of our not so cat friendly neighbours did it when shooing him out.
Took him to the vet and they amputated the last two vertibrea and stitched up the end.
Healed fine and hasn't bothered him a bit, so i'm not sure abiut this gluing bit?
The reason they glued was partly to do with me. It was £300 to carry out the stitching and I do not have £300. Horrible I know, but he said he would glue and see how it went. After the "procedure" he advised it was successful and may have turned out to be a better option.Took him to the vet and they amputated the last two vertibrea and stitched up the end.
Healed fine and hasn't bothered him a bit, so i'm not sure abiut this gluing bit?
The glue will only work if there is a viable blood supply to the damaged tail. Luckily cats heal well but they still need blood to flow to the damaged area and tails can be poor in this area, the licking and chewing will not help at all and as said above can cause more damage and infection.
I wouldn't worry re the tissue you saw. Could be just some fibrous tissue or tendon but unlikely to be a long term worry.
Hopefully you'll know in next few days if it has worked though.
Pet insurance would've covered this.
Hope kitty is ok.
I wouldn't worry re the tissue you saw. Could be just some fibrous tissue or tendon but unlikely to be a long term worry.
Hopefully you'll know in next few days if it has worked though.
Pet insurance would've covered this.
Hope kitty is ok.
[/quote] I don't think a bigger collar is even available as the one she has she gets stuck in when she walks and is very large for her. Either she has a very long tail or is an extremely flexible kitten.
[/quote]
In that case i would consider dressing the tail, wrapping it in a bandage or something similar just to create a barrier between the kittens mouth and the wound.
Best of Luck
One of my cats got his tail caught in a door, I could have used it as a set square for a good few weeks after. It only caused him a little bit of pain (after obviously) and a few months later you'd never have known.
Still got full sensitivity the full length of the tail.
My mums last cat had to have about 2cm taken off the end of his tail after an accident, he was just grateful it didn't hurt like hell any more, before he had the end taken off he couldn't sit or lie down without a lot of pain.
I suppose with yours now this 5cm bit of stuff has come out, there's no putting it back in so I wouldn't worry about it.
If it's nerve and s/he's lost feeling in the end of their tail you'll know soon enough, but there's nothing you can do about it.
Still got full sensitivity the full length of the tail.
My mums last cat had to have about 2cm taken off the end of his tail after an accident, he was just grateful it didn't hurt like hell any more, before he had the end taken off he couldn't sit or lie down without a lot of pain.
I suppose with yours now this 5cm bit of stuff has come out, there's no putting it back in so I wouldn't worry about it.
If it's nerve and s/he's lost feeling in the end of their tail you'll know soon enough, but there's nothing you can do about it.
When we got our two from the CPL the more adventurous of them (Skippy) we noticed had a bent tail tip so I imagine this is what she did. She's fine.
Just to add on the infection side just keep an eye on the wound if you see any swelling, quick change of colour, or opening of the wound then probably best to get to the vets other than that any wounds our previous cats have had tend to go from reddy\pink to dark pink light purply\pink to white as it heals over a period of a week to 10 days but this seems to depend on the size of wound and the age of the cat.
Skippy has got herself into some fights recently and has some tears in her ear - we cleaned these up with cooled boiled salt water twice a day and they healed within a few days with the above in mind.
Just to add on the infection side just keep an eye on the wound if you see any swelling, quick change of colour, or opening of the wound then probably best to get to the vets other than that any wounds our previous cats have had tend to go from reddy\pink to dark pink light purply\pink to white as it heals over a period of a week to 10 days but this seems to depend on the size of wound and the age of the cat.
Skippy has got herself into some fights recently and has some tears in her ear - we cleaned these up with cooled boiled salt water twice a day and they healed within a few days with the above in mind.
my dog broke his tail (excessive wagging, and caught it on the edge of something) he had to have his tail removed This may bring some consolation, but where I live it is very rare to see a cat with a normal straight tail. Some are bent in a couple of places, some have 90 degree bends. Some are short and stumpy.
I don't know if it is some cultural thing, break every cats tail at birth, or whether they are just unlucky. Or maybe they just grow like that in Asia.
To see a straight tail is very rare. And it doesn't seem to bother the flea-bitten, whining, howling, breeding-like-rabbits keep-me-awake-at-night little b
ds! 
I don't know if it is some cultural thing, break every cats tail at birth, or whether they are just unlucky. Or maybe they just grow like that in Asia.
To see a straight tail is very rare. And it doesn't seem to bother the flea-bitten, whining, howling, breeding-like-rabbits keep-me-awake-at-night little b
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