What Is Jaundice in Cats and Its Symptoms?
📝 Summary
Jaundice is yellowing of skin or mucus membranes from increased blood bilirubin, a bile pigment made from heme in the reticuloendothelial system. As it is excreted in bile, hemolytic disease, liver injury, and bile-duct damage all cause jaundice; thus jaundice is non-specific, and finding its cause needs other signs and history.
1 Overview
Jaundice has three causes:
1. Pre-hepatic (mainly hemolytic anemia)
2. Hepatic (hepatitis, liver tumors, poisoning, etc.)
3. Post-hepatic (cholangitis, gallstones, etc.)
Common jaundice-causing diseases:
Autoimmune, Heinz-body, and infectious hemolytic anemia. Onion, acetaminophen, and aspirin are easily given by unaware owners, causing poisoning—acetaminophen is common in human cold medicine; always consult a vet, and never feed anything uncertain.
Liver/bile inflammatory: viral, protozoal, bacterial infection, cholangitis, hepatitis, drug-induced, etc.
Non-inflammatory: tumors, fatty liver, extrahepatic bile obstruction. Early signs are non-specific—poor appetite, weight loss, diarrhea, constipation; prompt diagnosis and treatment usually leads to recovery.
Signs:
Easily seen: yellow mucus membranes and sclera; severe cases show yellowing/cyanosis of skin; centrifuged jaundiced blood shows yellow serum.
Jaundice is only a symptom of many diseases; if suspected, take the cat to the vet at once to find and treat the underlying cause.
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