Shopping Basket

Get started by adding courses to your basket.View All Courses

No products in the basket.

Shopping Basket

Get started by adding courses to your basket.View All Courses

No products in the basket.

Guidance for Veterinary Teams: Helping A Cat Feel Comfortable

Caroline Clark Qualified Clinical Animal Behaviourist and Veterinary Nurse
10/02/2024

Administering Medication and Taking Bloods in the Veterinary Environment

  • Work cooperatively with the cat and look for signals of consent.
  • Make sure personnel have been trained and follow the accepted cat-friendly methods for administering medication and drawing blood samples.
  • Always be prepared with equipment and materials at hand.
  • Look at alternatives e.g. if cats resent oral medication consider a long-acting injectable alternative if one is available.
  • Consider using pill-giving devices (e.g. pill-poppers).
  • Try hiding medication in favourite food or tasty treats.
  • Drugs can be compounded – i.e. rendered into a flavoured formula by a special pharmacy.
  • Some injectable drugs can be warmed to room temperature which can make them feel less uncomfortable when being administered (always check the data sheets to ensure this does not affect the product’s efficacy).
  • For giving injections and taking blood samples, always select the smallest gauge needle possible.
  • Withdraw the drug/vaccine from the bottle with a different needle to the one used to inject the cat because blunting or damaging the tip during withdrawal can increase injection discomfort.
  • Use topical local anaesthetic creams on the skin for cats that object to being touched with a needle or when multiple injections are required.

Adapted from AAFP and ISFM Feline-Friendly Handling Guidelines. Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery, by Rodan I. et al. (2011)

Caroline Clark
Caroline has a long and varied career working with companion animals. After many years working as a veterinary nurse she attended teacher training college and pursued a career in education - teaching veterinary nursing and other animal related subjects. Caroline's interest in behaviour led her to Southampton University where she gained a post graduate diploma in companion animal behaviour counselling and, after qualifying in 2006, she opened her own behaviour referral clinic in Yorkshire . She is a full member of the Association of Pet Behaviour Counsellors (APBC) and is one of only a relatively small number of specialists to have achieved the status of Registered Clinical Animal Behaviourist (CAB) with the Animal Behaviour Training Council. (ABTC). Caroline is the author of two books: Fear and Anxiety in Dogs, published by Crowood Press and A Professional's Guide to Feline Behaviour, published by CRC Press. Caroline has also written several articles for veterinary journals, is a public speaker and has appeared as the animal specialist on the 20 part, Channel Four TV series, ‘Embarrassing Pets’ which is still aired worldwide.