My indoor cat has balding, scabs, and dandruff. What can I do?

Question

hi. my 9 year old male cat is bolding with scabs and very bad dandraph. he is nuetered, and compleatly indoors. i can't aford a vet visit, but some meds on chewy.com we can afford. we realy could use some advice please. Pet's info: Cat | American Shorthair | Male | neutered | 8 years and 3 months old | 20 lbs

Jennifer Summerfield, DVM CPDT-KA · Accepted Answer

Poor Kamakazi! I'm sorry to hear that he's having skin issues. Unfortunately, there are a number of different things that can cause skin problems like this in cats - most of them will require prescription medication from your vet to treat, so I'm afraid there is probably no way around taking him to the vet for this. If he isn't currently on any medication for fleas, one thing you could try is applying a topical flea medication such as Advantage to see if this helps. If not, then it's likely that his condition is due to an allergy of some kind, a bacterial or fungal skin infection, or skin mites (mange). In that case, he will definitely need to see a vet, as none of these problems can be treated with over the counter medication. A vet visit for this problem does not necessarily need to be expensive - in my area, an exam fee is usually around $45. After that, even if you aren't able to afford any testing, the vet can discuss some options for treating the problem symptomatically with inexpensive prescription meds such as a steroid or antibiotic if needed.

My indoor cat has balding, scabs, and dandruff. What can I do?

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