Preventative Wellness Care: Understanding the Life Stages of Felines from Kitten to Senior

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• What to Expect at your Vet Visit for Kitties
• What to Expect at your Vet Visit for Adolescents
• What to Expect at your Vet Visit for Adult Cats
• What to Expect at your Vet Visit for Senior Cats

What to Expect at your Vet Visit for Kittens:

All Creatures strives to improve the human-animal bond. In order to do so, we take the time during your first visit to discuss the lifestyle of your pet, as well as provide you, the owner, educational materials to help prepare you to be the best pet parent you can be! This appointment can be 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on your previous knowledge and experience in owning a pet.

All Creatures recommends that client order a “Fecal Check Workup” for their kitten’s on its first visit. These tests will look for parasitic intestinal worms, such as hookworms, whipworms, roundworms, and tapeworms. It also looks for protozoan parasites called giardia or coccidia. Lastly, it looks for bacterial overgrowths that may cause stomach issues and diarrhea. We recommend this be done at your first vet visit, and again once you have completed all kitten vaccines. Check out our Labwork section for more information.

While your kitten is growing, it will need vaccines to be administered. Kittens receive more vaccines than adult cats because their immune system is not strong enough when they are young to fight illnesses. Once they have received all their kitten vaccines, their immune system should be strong enough to safely interact with other pets. Our medical staff will take advantage of these vaccine visits to check that your pet is growing well and receiving the best care needed to grow up healthy. See our Cat Vaccines page for more information.

Need more kitty info? Check out our Kitten Pack links on the main Cat Resources page!

What to Expect at your Vet Visit for Adolescents Cat Care

Once your kitten is 6-months old, your pet is now an adolescent, and we can consider some additional services to keep your pet healthy.

We recommend your kitten is Neutered or Spayed between 6 months old to 1 year old. This procedure helps your pet’s wellness in many ways, which includes reducing your pet’s risk of getting cancer at a younger age. While your kitten is under anesthesia, the vet can better see if your kitten has any retained baby teeth that may need to be removed, and this can be taken care of during the spay or neuter procedure so an additional anesthetic procedure is not necessary later. We always want to reduce how often a pet is put under anesthesia since there is always a risk in vet medicine when putting a pet under anesthesia.

If you cat is a type that will need grooming by a groomer as an adult (such as shave-downs for long-haired breeds), we recommend you schedule an appointment with a cat groomer at this age so the cat can become comfortable at a young age with getting bathed and groomed. Kittens can be exposed to getting their nails trimmed and teeth brushed much younger than 6-months old – the early you expose them, the less they will be frightened of it in the future!

What to Expect at your Vet Visit for Adult Cat Care

Between the ages of 1 year old up 7 years old, we consider your cat to be an adult feline. We recommend your pet come in twice a year: once for the Yearly, where we can perform your vaccines and labwork, and then a Semi-Annual where we can just check on your pet to see if there are any issues to address.

During these years, we find pet parents need the most guidance about nutrition and behavior issues. We also start seeing allergies to grass or food become more prevalent during these years. We provide nutritional, behavioral, and allergy consultations via appointment to help you learn more about the issues and treatment options. Check out our Nutritional & Behavioral Consultations sections for more information.

What to Expect at your Vet Visit for Senior Cat Care

Our vets consider cats over the age of 7 years to be “senior” cats. Cats are susceptible to many medical issues once they enter the senior stages in their lives, so we recommend additional services during their Yearly and Semi-Annual Exams in order to check for these medical issues and work to prevent them or reduce their severity in a timely manner. The most common issues we are looking for are the following:

• Kidney (Renal) problems & Disease
• Diabetes
• Cancer
• Hyperthyroidism
• Arthritis

Cats are very good at hiding their pain, so it is important to take note of any behavioral issues as your pet gets older as they may be signs of underlying issues that need attention. We recommend all senior cats have a “Comprehensive Bloodwork & Urinary Screening Package” be performed twice a year, which will help the vet see any progression of internal medical issues that they cannot physically see in an exam alone.
Need more cat care info? Check out our links on the main Cat Resources page!