OK,
In about an hour and a half I have to take my sister's remaining, surviving cat to the vet.

I noticed in his stool yesterday while cleaning out the litter box (a joy in my life I can only begin to touch upon), that there were multiple tiny white maggoty looking things in his crap. Moreover, his crap appeared rather liquidy.

Now I googled types of worms but the closest looking worm to the little white ones coming out of his ass are called round worms (which are supposedly about an inch and half long). These worms aren't that.

They're tiny, fat , maggoty looking worms, possibly a half inch long at the most.

Either way I guess I'll get the diagnosis in a couple of hours, but I'm wondering what that could be? Is it dangerous? How does one get rid of them?


Please tell me this cat isn't going to die on me too. That would suck ass.

first

WASH YOUR HANDS!!!!!



the worms break off when they exit the animal, take a sample of the poop with you to the vet. sounds like roundworms.


did I say

WASH YOUR HANDS

and every place that cat has laid, humans can get them too.

Do you let him outside? If so, after this episode it might be a good idea to keep him as an indoor kitty.

Poor kitty and Dan.

butterfli25 said:

oh man. well, look on the bright side. maybe the dustmites will eat them first

XxAxX said:

Ugh...how horrible. Dan - can you hire someone to come and disinfect your house?

applekisses said:

right, i'm sorry to be joking around. in actual fact after obtaining treatment for the cat and cleaning the house i would tell my own doctor that i had been exposed to worms and take a course of meds to eradicate any potential infection.

i do hope this works out, Imago

Does she have fleas?

shanti0608 said:

No fleas.

Also strictly an indoor cat.


This cat doesn't even like to go near the front door of the house.



Although I keep the litter box in the garage and he has to walk through is little cat door to get to it--that's as outside as this cat gets.

Imago said:

by the way, all joking aside, i think it is incredibly cool of you to care for your sister's cats this way.

my totally inside cat got worms several years ago, it was either fleas or mosquitoes according to the vet.

I totally freaked out though, because of my kids, I just washed everything in hot water and scrubbed the couch which is where I first saw the little buggers


he hasn't had any since and has even managed to escape once or twice since then.

butterfli25 said:

okay what? FLEAS can cause worms?

oh and it's not life threatening. If she were anemic enough for it to be a problem you would have noticed by now. The vet will give her this medicine and she will pass all of them, again the JOY of your life.


yes and KUDOs to you for taking care of this kitty.


question: what did you do with her while you were away? did you board her? that may be where she got exposed

XxAxX said:

I don't know the whole why and where of it but yeah according to the vet that's how they get them

butterfli25 said:

Oh man. I haven't noticed anything on my kitties, but I'll keep a closer watch.

Imago said:

Hate to break it to you but even strictly indoor cats can have fleas.
YOU could have carried them in



ok.. I am serious!

fleas can cause worms??? this is SO not okay.

butterfli25 said:

I deducted a hundred bucks from my roomate's rent and he took care of her here at home.

He loves cats, so it wasn't a big deal. The cat sleeps with him and one of his various troll-like girlfriends at night anyways.

Imago said:

he needs to wash his bed clothes in hot water

Imago said:

Sounds like someone has brought fleas home to the cat.

okay. FLEAS????? CAN CAUSE WORMS?????

if i was bitten by fleas at my SO's place, could i have worms too??

XxAxX said:

Yes, my cat's nine years old and so far has had these worms twice. They were both caused by fleas, according to the vet, even though I use Advantage on her regularly. We had an additional cat in the house at the time (my roommate's), who had come in from the outdoors and never left.

Humans can get it too, so if you're super freaked about it, check out your doodies!

INSATIABLE said:

well, come to think of it i was probably bitten by sand fleas at the beach, not at his house. i think he said his dogs got fleas after that. however, it was a dog beach.

XxAxX said:

Yeah, you're probably a bit more freaked than necessary. Think about the amount of critters with fleas. The number of critters with round worms are probably dwarfed in comparison.

Christ, like all of Danny's threads, this one has made me feel absolutely filthy.

INSATIABLE said:

me too! i'd rather confront dustmites.

sounds like your cat has tapeworms. they're mainly transmitted through fleas and both my indoor cats have had them in the past.

If it is tapeworm, it's very easily treatable and not too much of a big deal.

And I don't think that humans can get tapeworms from flea bites. I think a human would have to eat a flea or a tapeworm segment in order to get infected.

However humans can get other kinds of tapeworms from eating undercooked or raw beef and pork.

Do the worms coming out of your cat look like this:



because that is what tapeworm generally looks like.
[Edited 7/24/08 11:14am]

JasmineFire said:

I was thinking of tapeworms too. My parents had a cat who got tapeworms several times, and had little maggott-looking worms coming out of his butt. It was disgusting, but just a shot and the cat was as good as new after a few days.
[Edited 7/24/08 11:41am]

JasmineFire said:

yes!!!!

Imago said:

Bingo! There you go. Sounds like your cat has a tapeworm.

But wth, don't americans know you're supposed to de-worm your pets at least twice a year, out- or indoor???? It's not a waiting-till-it-happens game people, it's a make-sure-it-never-happens game.
Hop to it if you haven't done it!