Usually, your dog will show signs of discomfort. They may wink at you, keep their eye closed, or have excessive tearing. Tears may spill down the nasal area, and they may even sneeze due to the tears running into their nose. The eye might also appear red and irritated.

Some types of pain in cats could be caused by an injury, such as a cat bite abscess which are incredibly painful. The cat might show an area of a wound or hair loss and swelling in the area of the injury. Lameness or limping is also a sign of pain. If your cat used to jump a lot but is now staying down on the floor more and not going up in vertical spaces, that can be a sign of arthritic pain. Unfortunately, cancer growing in the body can also cause pain, making the cat seem more reclusive or tired.

Some signs your cat may be in pain could include: they may go and hide (which I call suffering silently), they may be reluctant to eat or drink, they might show some lameness or mobility issues, they may not groom themselves as much resulting in an unkempt or matted hair coat. Pain signs can be subtle and cats don't usually vocalize when they're in pain, although they could if the pain is severe, especially if you touch a painful area. They might show aggression or even vocalize with some pain.

There are a lot of other allergy medications your cat can take. We are going to prescribe or recommend allergy medication depending on what type of allergy your pet actually has. So that can only really be determined when you actually bring your cat in to see us. We have these conversations. We might do some testing and then we're going to prescribe the correct medication that is appropriate for your cat and their type of allergies. So we really recommend that if you feel like your cat may have an allergic type problem either with their skin or digestive issues, we want you to reach out to your veterinarian. Please schedule that appointment to get them seen, and if you have any more questions related to cat allergies, we invite you to reach out to Blue Oasis Pet Hospital. We're here to help.

You could give your cat Benadryl, but we don't recommend it. It doesn't last for very long, only about four to six hours and nobody's ever going to redose their cat every four to six hours with Benadryl. It could cause sleepiness and we would dose it depending on the size of your cat. So even though Benadryl is not particularly unsafe to give a cat, it's not very effective and I would never recommend that you give your cat any over-the-counter medications, even Benadryl, without consulting with your veterinarian.

Food allergies are diagnosed with a food elimination trial. So we have to prescribe a hypoallergenic diet, or we call it a novel protein diet which is a food that only has a protein that your cat has never eaten before and we are gonna feed that specific food for usually about 8 to 12 weeks for a food trial time. In that time, your cat gets no other foods at all. They only get the prescription diet and treats that we might prescribe, and we're looking to see if your cat's symptoms improve while they're on that food and that's how we diagnose food allergies.

We can prescribe some medication that can be taken orally to treat skin allergies. We can also partner again with a dermatologist to do customized allergy shots for your cat with seasonal allergies.

Yes, cats can actually have seasonal allergies. They can be allergic to grasses, trees, molds, fleas, and things that are just part of our natural cycle of seasons. They can be hard to diagnose. Often we have to partner with a dermatologist. Cats can have allergy testing on their skin just like you and me, and when that happens, we're looking to see what they are allergic to, and we want to customize some allergy shots for them. So they do get seasonal allergies, and usually, you're going to see your cat presents with just intense overgrooming of their hair coat and they're just thinning their hair. That is usually the main symptom of seasonal allergies in cats.