Hello,
Sorry for the long post but we probably need to explain the whole story.
We have a 1 year old Bengal boy and 8.5 months old Bengal girl. The boy has never had any stomach or other issues since we got him. The girl, has had soft poops since we got her. She is the most energetic creature we've ever seen and has a very healthy appetite! Apart from her soft stools she is healthy and happy. They are both indoor cats and go out only in the garden with us. She was tested for all sorts of different parasites just after we got her. All the tests were negative and we were given some antibiotics and recommended to experiment with food in case she was allergic to some ingredients in the food they were on at the time. No matter what we tried her poo was still soft with occasional firm samples. At the end after a number of different foods we left them on RC kitten dry and applaws wet which they both loved.
Then 6 weeks ago our boy started having blood in his stool... So we took him to the clinic straight away together with his poo sample.
Vet#1: Physical condition was examined: stomach, temperature, eyes, ears, gums and it was all fine. We were given Prokolin and advised to starve them for 36 hours, then keep them on just boiled chicken for 2 weeks. His poo sample was just chucked in a bin. Result: after a week both of them started having absolutely runny bums! We stopped as they were loosing too much liquid and became really unhappy.
Vet#2: Both cats were taken to the clinic with their liquid poo samples. Again, physical condition was examined and both of them were fine. We then asked to examine both their poos for TF as there were a few cases registered lately especially with Bengals. vet#2 suggested not to test for TF as it was still very rare and very expensive. Instead, the vet suggested to test the girl's poo for giardia and some other parasites as she had a history of soft stools and it could become chronic. As for the boy, we were told that most likely he ate something that caused some damage to colon, which is not that uncommon. To fix that we should give him bland food+Prokolin and some pills and maybe try Hills z/d. Result: His sample went in a bin. Hers came back negative as we expected, as she'd been tested before and the vet knew that from clinical notes...
Vet#3: Both their poos improved slightly. Our little boy was still having blood in his. More and more often he'd go to the box but just to release some gas without any poo... We took samples and cats again to the clinic together with some info on TF PCR testing and price ranges which were way lower than we were quoted. The vet said there was no reason not to test them for TF. We were also suggested to put them on Ronidazol course in case of false negative results. As this drug isn't licensed in the UK it was ordered for us from the US. It's been 2 weeks since the order was placed and we are still waiting...In the mean time he started having dark pieces of dry blood coming out together with his stool. After switching to z/d both of them started having some white specs in their stools (have no idea what those are but will get it tested).
The girl seems to be her normal self but our boy became really weak for the last 5 days. Even now I'm typing this message with him curled up on my lap as if asking for help instead of running around with his little sister as they normally do... If I don't move he can spend hours on my lap (not normal behaviour for him). He also feels quite warm but unfortunately we don't have a thermometer to test his temperature.
Going to the clinic again tomorrow. Will probably ask to do blood test and screening. Just feel really helpless as he is definitely unwell and we don't even know what it could be...Just was hoping to get some advice on what else we can do to help our boy.
