Purrmore Tip: Teach Your Cat To Take Medication Before They Need It

Even though your cat is healthy and happy, there may come a time in the future when they will need to take medication. If you and your cat are not prepared, giving medication may become a stressful experience for both you and your cat.

You can take away the stress by teaching your cat techniques for taking medication before they need it.

Even if giving medication to your cat in their food worked well in the past, in the future, they may be prescribed medication that will impact the flavor of the food to the extent that they may develop an aversion to their own food, which is not a risk worth taking.

Creating a medication station (or Treat-ment Station) where your cat feels comfortable being handled is a first step. Then, you can use various medication techniques, like the 1-2-3 technique, in which a cat learns to take a treat, followed by medication, and then is rewarded with another treat. It helps to give those treats in a fast sequence so that the cat will quickly take the medication in step #2 and look forward to the yummy treat in step #3.

The links below provide resources about the different types of medications you can train for. The first link is a bonus - a video of Bradley (the gorgeous orange boy in the picture) taking his medication using the technique that worked best for him (Churu!).