Sniffling, sneezing cat.

For the past two days our cat has been constantly sniffling and sneezing and has also had diarrhea. He has been pretty normal in personality and eating habits, although today he seems more lethargic. I am wondering if this is a cold/flu that he has, and if so, does he require veterinary treatment, or just like in humans, does something like this seem to run its course (unless serious, my doctor tends to tell me just to go home and get some rest if I show up with flu like symptoms)? Of note, we should mention that he is on asthma medication (prednisolone steroids tablets), which has been on for a number of weeks. He adjusted well to them and they helped his asthma. I don't think there is a link between his cold/flu symptoms and diarrhea, although I was never given a list of possible side effects for this medication. So we'd be very interested to hear what you have to say. Thanks for your help!!

Hi Dr. Marie,

Thanks for your advice regarding our cat, Keane. There have been a few developments in his situation - overall he is feeling ok, but we are still faced with a puzzle of getting rid of his diarrhea.

We took him to the vet the day after your response at the end of March, who said a couple of things:
1)his diarrhea might be caused by stress (he loves to explore and had gotten into our upstairs neighbours apartment - now he sits at our door meowing to get back in there feeling tortured that we're not letting him go).
2)his diarrhea might be caused by a return of giardia (he had this parasite last year, which was hard to get rid of)

The vet gave us some metronitozle (sp?) to firm up his stool, which worked, but when we took him off of it (10 days later), the diarrhea returned. During this time, however, was Easter and we had no one to look after Keane. So we took him in the car which certainly added more stress (although, he wasn't too bad and didn't meow).

So when the diarrhea returned, we worried that it may be due to a reinfection of the giardia. So we took a stool sample in and they did the test specifically for this parasite, which came back negative.

So we've narrowed it down likely to stress, but have him back on metronitozole. Also, knowing what we know now about him being under stress we are experimenting with modifying his diet, trying to de-stress his environment by playing a lot more, finding him interesting things to explore.

With that long pre-amble, let me ask my questions:
Are we able to wean him off of the metronitozole by decreasing the duration/amount per dosage?

We've been adding some rice flour and acidopholous to his food because we've heard that rice is good to settle the stomach and probiotics are also said to aid in his digestion.

I've also heard that fasting a cat can aid in decreasing its likelihood of diarrhea, is that a wise idea?

Finally, are there any other thoughts about why this issue has come out of the blue, and any other thoughts about what might be the cause/cure?

Thanks Dr. Marie!