My Cat Is Breathing Fast
How to count a cat’s breathing rate at home, what is normal, and why open mouth breathing in a cat is almost always an emergency.
Is this an emergency?
Open mouth breathing in a cat is almost always an emergency. Healthy cats do not pant. Come in immediately and handle the cat as little as possible on the way.
Count the rises of the chest for thirty seconds while the cat is asleep and double it.
Breathing is one of the few things you can measure accurately at home, and in cats it is one of the most useful early warnings there is.
Counting the rate
Count while your cat is asleep or resting quietly, not just after play. One breath is one rise and fall of the chest. Count for thirty seconds and double it.
A resting rate under 30 breaths per minute is normal. Consistently over 30 while asleep needs checking. Over 40 needs checking today.
Counting the sleeping rate over a few evenings is worth doing for any cat with known heart disease. A rising trend often shows before anything else does.
Open mouth breathing
Unlike dogs, healthy cats do not pant. A cat breathing with its mouth open is either in severe respiratory distress, in heart failure, or extremely stressed and overheated.
Occasionally a cat will pant briefly after intense play or a stressful car journey and settle within a few minutes. Anything beyond that is an emergency.
Other signs of difficulty
- Using the abdomen visibly to breathe
- Standing with the neck extended and elbows held away from the body
- Refusing to lie down, or lying only on the chest
- Blue, grey or very pale gums and tongue
- Noisy breathing, wheezing, or a soft grunt on each breath
Blue or grey gums mean the blood is not carrying enough oxygen. That is immediate.
What causes it
Fluid in or around the lungs from heart disease, feline asthma, pneumonia, chest trauma, anaemia, pain, high temperature, poisoning, and a tumour in the chest.
In cats, heart disease frequently produces no signs at all until it produces breathlessness, which is why the change can seem so sudden.
What to do
Keep the cat calm and still. Stress worsens oxygen demand, and a cat in respiratory distress can decompensate from handling alone.
Put it in a carrier without a struggle if you can, keep the room quiet and cool, and drive in. Call ahead, so oxygen is ready when you arrive.
Do not force the mouth open, do not try to give water, and do not restrain the cat on its back.
What we do
Oxygen first, before any examination, in a cat that is struggling. Once it is stable enough we listen to the chest, take an X-ray or ultrasound scan, and treat according to what we find.