does anyone have a cat with eye problems?

[AussieRene]

our oldest cat - he was born in 1998 - is white with ginger patches and has chronic gunky eyes. the vet says it is because of the sun and the fact that his skin is too white(not enough pigment) and it goes away and comes back all the time. it doesn't hurt him or anything. just looks yucky

[veggiegirl]

Wow, I've never heard of that before. Poor kitty. I'm glad it doesn't hurt him though.

[Amethystbelle]

My friends cat, a british short hair has had eye problems simular to yours, it comes and goes but nothing vets can do!

[pihlaja]

His skin is too white? Is he albino?

I've never heard of something like that. Galina (the kitten in my signature with the brown markings on the head and blue eyes) had problems with gunky eyes as a kitten. The vet gave us a type of gel substance that I had to put in her eyes. It took a few weeks of using the stuff, but it finally cleared up and hasn't come back.

Poor kitty. I guess a warm, damp cloth is all that really helps the poor bugger? Give him some lovies for me.

[Keritsubo]

Huh, peculiar situation but glad it doesn't hurt him. When we bring in the out door kitties or our cats eyes get gunky we buy goldenseel. You can get the capsuls and just open it and put a few drops of water with it. It works pretty good to clear their eyes up.

[Candycane]

My male, Max used to have chronic eye gunkies as well. He was diagnosed IBS and after we got that under control, we put him on a human grade, high quality food (no corn, soybeans, by-products, collective feed terms, man-made preservative), they cleared up almost completely. He doesn't received anything other than cat food. However, on occasion he has gotten a scrap that's fallen off the counter, or eaten our other cat's food and his eyes gunk up within the day.

What are you feeding your cat?

[SpookyCats]

Sebastian was getting eye boogers for a while.Then I noticed he was walking around with one eye closed so I we took him to the vet and the vet said it could be some kind of virus. It was weird because the stuff would line his eye. She gave him some special drops and his eyes cleared up. He still gets eye boogers in the corner of his eyes though.

[Linda Lee]

I was going to ask here if anyone had any ideas about treating herpes in cats. I have 1 that's about 5 yrs old now (Dunkin) , a few months ago I adopted a partially feral cat(Moo Moo) , right after I got her I noticed she was sick, i managed to get her to vet and he said she has a feline herpes virus that's causing her to have symptoms like a cold. He said it would never go away , but would probably go into remission and than come and go with stress. Anyway the reason I'm telling you all this is because my healthy cat Dunkin now has a weepy eye- which is a common symptom of Herpes - I'm very upset about this because it can get serious and even cause eye sight loss.
So herpes is another thing that causes cats to have chronic gunky eyes. I hear L Lysin 500mg a day crushed in their food sometimes helps.
If anyone has any other ideas on helping this problem please post.

[Dena]

Quote: Originally Posted by Linda Lee I hear L Lysin 500mg a day crushed in their food sometimes helps. If anyone has any other ideas on helping this problem please post.

Yes Lysine works wonders. We go through many bottle of this. We noticed around Christmas time that when kitten come in (for some reason we have a small baby boom of feral kittens at this time) that this virus spreads like wildfire through our isolation. When they first get it its awful so now we use an antibiotic oinment in their eyes and give them lysine and it has given us incredible results. We only ended up with one cloudy eye out of 16 kittens.

Since in the shelter all we see are ferals many have this chronic condition and they are constantly on Lysine. I pay $6.50 for a bottle of 100 capsules of 500mg. Make sure you try to find powder filled capsules, they are much easier to work with. Also it has a very salty taste, yes I tasted it because I wanted to see what they were eating all time.

[Candycane]

Yep, Dena is correct, Lysine is great stuff.

[Linda Lee]

Thanks for letting me know this, it makes me feel so much better knowing most likely Dunkin will get better. I heard the Lysin works better for the eye problem and not as well for the respiratory problem like I'm seeing in Moo Moo.
They both eat the treated food with no problem. I use tablets- they crush into a powder form very easy.
Thanks again!

[Candycane]

That's great that they are eating the food. In case you run into more troubles, I frequent a cat forum, The Cat Site Forums and they are awesome over there! The forum is dedicated entirely to cats so there are a ton of experienced people...I have read many threads on herpes and lysine.

[Linda Lee]

I was very lucky, or should I say Dunkin is very lucky. His eye got better already. I used terrimysin (sp?) , now it looks great. I think my dog scratched him in the eye and that's what caused the problem. Thank goodness it's not herpes!