I know what is wrong with Bella, if you have been a regular reader then you may know I mentioned that my cat Bella as not been very well.

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At first I thought she had a hairball, its difficult to explain what is wrong with her but it sounded like she's wheezing with a type of congested chest infection.
She as what seems almost like what you could describe as cough's but doesn't bring anything up.

Her normal breathing almost sounded like purring "but its not purring", this type of sound was occurring because she was very congested up, and it was not like having a blocked-up nose either, but more like something was very wrong from inside, so most likely her lungs.

I know that cats can often get upper respiratory infections, if your cat shows any signs of a respiratory illness you could be noticing things like sneezing, wheezing, runny eyes or nose.

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Upper airway infections are caused by viruses, and untreated these infections can lead to secondary infections resulting in chronic problems and of course even death.

90% of all upper airway infections are caused by two common viruses but then there are also things fungi, bacteria, tumours or dental disease that could cause the potential problem with Bella or your cat's breathing ability.

Another big culprit is often Asthma a inflammation of the small passageways it can possibly make the lungs discharge a mucus into the airways leading to fits of coughing and wheezing.

A expert in the field Dr. Gibbons explains that coughing is more specific to the lungs and more commonly associated with asthma I feel like its not exactly coughing or breathing that Bella is having issues with, like I said it was difficult to explain but it seems perhaps its more like a congested wheezing and so according to the info it means Bella did not have Asthma either.

No.. unfortunately I discovered Bella as Pneumonia!

What is pneumonia?

Pneumonia is an infectious inflammatory disorder of the lung which is also why we are been keeping Bella away from any other cats.
The lungs are filled with thousands of small bronchi which end up in smaller sacs called alveoli.
The alveoli contain tiny blood vessels and the dam Pneumonia causes these alveoli to fill up with pus and fluids which affect the lungs.

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You can see where this is going related to Bella's problems and so what about the causes?

There are many causes..

Bacterial – Basically this may not come as a big surprise but there are many types of bacteria that can cause pneumonia in cats.

Virals – Upper respiratory infections are common in cats, feline calicivirus and herpesvirus are the most common of these.
The calicivirus which is where I was actually often hovering around when trying to figure out what was wrong with Bella its actually very much related to pneumonia, I guess at the time I just didn't think that what Bella as would of been so severe and pneumonia got overlooked.

Fungals – Fungal pneumonia infections are actually rare in cats because of this I didn't spent much time looking into much of their details.

Parasitic – This form of pneumonia is also rare in cats and almost always attacks either young kittens or
cats with a compromised immune system, but something like this I would expect from my other cat Toby and not Bella.
These parasites which can cause pneumonia include lungworm, toxoplasmosis, liver flukes and roundworms.

Aspiration- This is an interesting one, not related to my cat Bella's case but something to keep in mind, see cats are particularly vulnerable to aspiration pneumonia, the given mineral oils to treat hairballs or the inhalation of gastric contents during vomiting, so basically those cats who are often vomiter's are at a greater risk of developing aspiration pneumonia, crazy huh?

-Symptoms

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The most common symptom of pneumonia is a cough, a moist and dyspnea type (difficulty breathing) what I am now finding often described in many cases of pneumonia is a type of "rattling breathing" which I feel describes exactly how Bella's breathing is for most of the time.

Anyway other symptoms are fever, lethargy, rapid breathing, blue gums, loss of appetite, green or yellow nasal discharge, a rattling sound coming from the chest, Cyanosis (a blue tinge to mucous membranes of the mouth), a loss of appetite, weight loss, poor appearance, a unkempt coat and dehydration.

-Treatment

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With pneumonia the cat may have to stay in at the hospital for treatment if they are severely ill, milder cases may be treated at home which is what we are trying to do for Bellinha.
But treatment will depend on the cause of pneumonia and how severe is the case.

In Bella's case we have to be attentive to all her needs we are giving her the fluids she needs even if she refuses, this is to correct dehydration especially with the warmer weather recently this is very important, nutritional support which is working really well now, for her these include strong smelling foods, appetite stimulants or one can use a feeding tube if your cat refuses or is too weak.
While at one point we did force feed Bella I highly suggest not to try it often as it could potentially put them completely off their food which wont help their recovery, so be careful when doing such things.

Anyway here is a video which started to partly alerted me to what was really wrong with Bella this poor kitty seen in the video was basically at the same level of severity as Bella when I mentioned that others believed Bella was not make it for one more week.

While the poor kitty in the video died on the same day the video was taken Bella managed to recover, we are very lucky that she did and hopefully she will be out of the woods soon.

It was so difficult seeing her suffer like that and not being able to give her the treatment needed.

Video Of Lionel The Cat Breathing Difficulties

Lionel Can Alert Cat Owners Of Pneumonia

And now coming back from seeing my father Bella seems to have improved greatly but she still sometimes as this rattled breathing as unfortunately pneumonia is not easy to cure and Bella as now been battling this for over a month.

Video Source: Youtube.com