Phenobarbital in cats

wanderer 22

Hi all,

our 12 y/o cat has been on phenobarbital for seizure prevention for the past 3 months. It's working well but getting her to take it can be difficult. We have our ways and means but a longer term solution would be easier all round!

I've come across references to it being administered via a gel or liquid - as below:

"Cats can be difficult when it comes to pills twice daily long term so it may be helpful to employ a compounded oral liquid or transdermal gel (applied on the unhaired skin of the ear)."

Has anyone come across this in Ireland? Our vet said he doesn't know anywhere it's available here.

Thanks in advance

Alun

We looked into this for our cat who was on regular pain relief with gabapentin. It was a PITA as the only way we could get her to take it was to use a pill crusher and put it into a small amount of food when she was really, really hungry first thing in the morning.

It appears that in the US there's people called "compounding pharmacists" who will take existing medicines in one form and convert them to another, for example as a transdermal gel to rub into a cat's ear. They do it primarily for human medicines as I understand it, but also for animal medicines. I asked or vet who had never heard of it, and she also asked her sister who was a hospital pharmacist and she'd never heard of it either, so I think you're out of luck unfortunately.

https://compoundingrxusa.com/blog/exactly-compounding-pharmacist/

wanderer 22

Ah that's a pity but thanks so much for the reply.

SillyMangoX

I don’t have any advice on the liquid but my soon to be 12y/o cat is also on phenobarbital for epilepsy, he gets a quarter tablet twice a day and what I do is i crush the quarter between two spoons and stir it in through a liquid cat treat such as this, and he doesn’t even notice he’s taking it. He’s just happy he’s getting extra treats twice a day! No seizures since, and no struggles with pills :pac:

https://zooplus.page.link/qQLL

wanderer 22

Thanks for that, will give it a go!