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Chronic Sinusitis
Chronic sinusitis is making a good number of cats ill these days. It is a problem quite common to the humans. You must be prepared to help your cat fight with the disease. For this, it is important to understand chronic sinusitis and know its cause and treatment.
What causes chronic sinusitis?
Chronic sinusitis is often related with rhinitis and chronic nasal diseases. It can be really traumatic and frustrating for your pet to diagnose and even treat. Sinuses are gaps in the bones around the nose. They are spaces that contain air in face that air out and moisturize the air that the cat breaths in. In the normal operation, air passes through sinuses.
The sinuses may become inflamed inveterately with the result of several different disease processes. Some bacteria, fungi, parasites and viruses can cause chronic sinusitis in cats. Some allergy, infection, tumors and other problems also cause sinusitis.
Cats having viral sinusitis can have damage done to their nasal bones. Generally chronic cases of sinusitis have bacteria infection that is less important to the basic cause. Non infection are foreign bodies, allergy to breathed in molds, pollen and some of the allergy-causing substances, polyps, dental troubles and tumor either cancerous or non cancerous. When nasal discharge happens from one nostril and not both, the infectious cause is quite less possible.
Clinical signs and symptoms
The cats suffering from chronic sinusitis will
- Sneeze a lot
- Difficulty to breathe in thru nose
- Thick and yellow or green in color discharge coming out of nose
- Paw at their noses frequently
- Have nasal discharge
- Prone to have loss of appetite
- Impaired sense of smell
- Bad breath
- Fatigue
Treatment of sinusitis
Treatment of chronic sinusitis directly depends on the symptoms and the cause that underlie with it.
- The appropriate amount of antibiotics, anti fungus and parasiticides should be given to fight with different various infectious agents.
- Often the bacterial infections are required to be treated for about a month or more. In some of the cases the antibiotics should be given to the cat chronically.
- As the most of the cases of chronic sinusitis are related with the secondary bacterial infections, you should give antibiotics that may lead to irregular improvement in the symptoms that animal is showing up in spite of the fundamental cause of sinusitis. In case of allergic sinusitis, corticosteroids are given and attempts are made to get rid of the seditious allergen, if probable.
- To treat cancerous tumor, chemotherapy, radiation therapy and at times surgery is used. Surgery is also performed to remove the infected bones of sinus and nasal cavities.
- If you notice any sign of odd behavior or symptoms of chronic sinusitis, you must call your vet immediately.