How can I cure my cat's skin problem?

This is actually happening to my sisters cat right now too. Supposedly it is mites and she is scrubbing the spots with vinegar to kill them. I don’t know if it’s working yet.

Sometimes this can be the result of a food allergy. You should be able to see mites against bare skin under magnification. My first suggestion is to try a vet who doesn’t keep trying the same thing over and over in the face of no results.

You need to force her to not lick off the lotion and sprays, it shouldn’t matter that she dislikes them. You’re her owner, so it’s your job to take care of her, not let her get her way.

I vote for allergies. My MIL had similar problems and had to go through a variety of foods to find one that her cat did not react to.

I fought this and fought this, because I did not believe it was true with a cat I adopted from my Mom, who was bald in spots and spent most of her life chewing. The vet (when I inherited the cat) insisted it was a flea allergy. She said, “What would it hurt to try? If that doesn’t help, we will work with her diet to see if it is a food allergy.

Much to my amazement, flea treatment did the trick. All her hair grew back, and the rest of her life she was comfortable.

I had another cat that had a bad reaction to the substance that delivered the flea treatment. Once we put her on Revolution, she was fine.

Good luck.

Allergy of some sort is probably it, but figuring out what is the problem. First thing is does she have fleas, they can cause serious skin eruptions. Then food, as Dorkgirl says, you must eliminate different things for a couple of weeks at a time.

I see Marina beat me to the flea thing. If you separate the hair and see little black specks, that is probably flea poop and that means there are fleas there somewhere.

I’ve heard that extremes in cold can be beneficial to a cat’s overall health.

Freeze the fleas!

One of our cats had a similar problem. In her case it was hormones. Once she went on a daily pill the fur grew back in just fine, except it was now orange instead of black.

I would try another vet who is willing to start all over from the beginning.

Ask your vet for a referral to a veterinary dermatologist. Blindly guessing and trying different treatments without a diagnosis is only going to cost you lots of money and adversely affect her health.

Thank you for all your suggestions. I tend to agree with Darwin that it’s probably hormones, although one of the vets I took her to said absolutely not. Syz, you are probably right. I shall ask to be referred to a dermatology specialist as I feel at the moment all the different prescriptions she’s been given are pointless and expensive.

The other possibility is fleas, as this seems to be a very common cause, but she doesn’t go outside which makes it less likely, and no vet has found any black specks on her. However, I have heard that some cats are quite capable of removing all trace of fleas from their coats.

Anyway, thank you all for your help. (Tabatha thanks you too!)

@Alizon Keep us posted on what happens. Good luck to you and Tabatha.