From “Tom Cat” Blockages to Incontinence: Why Urinary Problems Turn Critical Fast

A cat that strains in the litter box and leaves nothing behind is not “being weird” that can be a clock-starting emergency. Julie Schwenzer and Dr. Mike LoSasso from Frisco Emergency Pet Care walk through urinary problems in dogs and cats with a clear focus on what becomes urgent, what can wait for a regular appointment, and what you should never ignore.

We talk about why female dogs and cats tend to get more urinary tract infections, what pet parents typically notice at home (frequent trips, accidents, blood in urine), and why quick testing matters. Then we shift to the scary cases: urinary obstruction. Dr. LoSasso explains how stones can lodge in the male dog urethra and why that can rapidly turn life-threatening as toxins and potassium build up when urine cannot leave the body.

Male cats get their own spotlight because their urethra narrows dramatically near the end, making them prone to “blocked tom” episodes from tiny stones or mucus plugs. We cover what emergency treatment usually involves (catheterization, IV fluids, electrolyte checks, multi-day hospitalization), why the bill can be a shock, and why recurrence is hard to predict. We also dig into prevention you can actually act on, including hydration, wet food vs dry food, and when a urinary diet is worth it.

If you care for a cat or dog, listen now, share this with a fellow pet parent, and subscribe so you do not miss the next practical ER guide. After you listen, leave a review and tell us: what urinary warning sign surprised you most?

To learn more about Frisco Emergency Pet Care visit:
https://www.FriscoEmergencyPetCare.com
Frisco Emergency Pet Care 
11201 Preston Road 
Frisco, Texas 75033 
469-287-6767 

Transcript

Welcome And Why Urinary Issues Matter

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Welcome to the Frisco Emergency Pet Care Podcast, your trusted source for expert insight into emergency veterinary medicine. Hosted by Dr. Mike Lasasso, Chief of Staff at Frisco Emergency Pet Care, this podcast brings you essential information to help protect the health and safety of your dogs and cats. Serving North Dallas with 24-7 emergency and critical care, the team at Frisco Emergency Pet Care is here when every second counts. Now, let's begin.

SPEAKER_02 0:40

Urinary problems can escalate fast, especially in cats. Today we're unpacking the most common issues, why they happen, and what every pet parent should know before it becomes an emergency. I'm Julie Schwenzer, co-host and producer, back with Dr. Mike Lasasso from Frisco Emergency Pet Care. Doctor, it's always great to be with you. And I know today you've stressed how important of a topic this is. So the challenge of urinary issues for cats and dogs, um, could we start with the bigger picture? What makes urinary problems such a common and urgent concern in veterinary medicine?

UTIs And Why Females Get Them

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Well, common and urgent may be two different descriptors there. So in females, female mammals in general have a much shorter urethra than male mammals of any species. And the way you prevent infection is clearing the urethra with the urine stream. So in females, we see we see a lot more urinary tract infections. So that's in in both dogs and cats. So we have lots of females that will come in that may have some blood inner urine or are urinating very frequently, and those are frequently infections. I see two or three of those a week. More dogs and cats, but it happens in both

Dog Stones And Dangerous Obstruction

SPEAKER_01 2:00

species. The scarier part is when you have an obstruction. So by that same token, because the urethra is so short and generally fairly wide in females, we rarely see stones causing obstructions in females. But in male dogs, we have a challenge because sometimes they'll get a bladder stone that gets in the urethra, which is the tube that connects the bladder to the outside, and they travel down the urethra. So that the dog is kind of, I don't think they're unique. There's another species that has a bone, but the dog has a bone that supports the body of the penis, and the urethra goes through a channel in that bone. So the reason that's important is if your stone has a larger diameter than the opening of that channel, that stone's not going anywhere. They're just going to start stacking up in the urethra and cause an obstruction, and that can be a life-threatening urinary problem because the bladder starts to fill. The toxins and the potassium that they're trying to get rid of in their urine is not able to get out of the body, and that can be a major problem. You know, and that has to be anesthesia and trying to flush those stones back up into the bladder so that then we can either keep a catheter in and allow them to urinate or take them straight to surgery and take the stones out that

Male Cat Blockage How It Happens

SPEAKER_01 3:32

way. Now, cats are a little bit different because the male cat is designed differently. The urethra in a cat goes from being fairly wide, think of a four-lane highway, and as it moves towards the outside, it narrows down to a bike path. And they're designed that way so that they can urinate under extreme pressures, right? It's kind of like holding your thumb over your garden hose to make it spray farther because that's how cats mark territory. They um it's called spraying. A dog will, dogs are not very cooth, they'll lift their leg and and be on a tree or a fire hydrant or whatever it is. Cats will kind of back up to a fence and they shoot this little jet of urine out to spray the fence, but they don't want urine all over them, right? So it's a it's a jet. That system works really well until you introduce a small stone or a mucus plug that's got some crystals in it. And as it travels down this four-lane highway, it's perfectly happy, but it's bigger than a bike path. And so these cats get this thing lodged in the typically in the very end of the urethra, and they can't urinate. And so these boys sometimes they're they're young, they're two, three. Um, usually by the time they're older, they've either done it before or they're not going to do it for whatever reason. And they come into us and they need to be unblocked, they need to have that blockage relieved. We need to re-establish urine flow. We need to get them on fluids to make sure that their kidneys aren't damaged, and then we eventually have to pull that urinary catheter and hope that they don't re-block. That doesn't sound maybe like like a lot. Maybe I made it sound like it is a lot. But the reality is we generally keep those guys in hospital for two or three days, and we are checking electrolytes and trying to make sure that everything is appropriate and that the urinary values are normalizing. So they tend to be fairly expensive cats. I would say, depending on where you are in the country and which corporations emergency hospital you're going into, you're probably looking at somewhere between $3,500 and $8,000 for that hospital stay. And there's no guarantee that they are not going to do it again three weeks later, three months later, seven years later. I it there's no way to predict when it's going to happen. There are some strategies to try to lengthen that time frame a little bit, mostly putting them on a wet food. Honestly, I would always feed a cat wet food anyway. Um it helps acidify the urine a little bit and it helps increase their their dietary water so they urinate a little bit more. Uh, it's also much better for weight control. Uh, but there is a there is a specific urinary diet that helps even more. But uh any wet food is better than any dry food, and the the wet urinary food is the best. And those guys are frequently on it for life. But it's it's definitely a shock when you've got what you think is a healthy two-year-old cat, you love him to death, and now you're looking at a at a $4,000 bill that came out of nowhere. And you know, all you notice was that he was going to the litter box and sometimes he was howling. And that's you know, you look and there's no production, there's no urine in that litter box. That's that's a problem, and it needs to be seen right away.

Prevention Clues Costs And When To Go

SPEAKER_02 7:19

In addition to diet, is there any way to get ahead of this in dogs and cats before something happens? Like, how do you even prevent stones or other blockages?

SPEAKER_01 7:29

The the only time stones are truly preventable is in females, mostly dogs, and that is by not tolerating urinary tract infections, because the stones in female dogs generally come from long-standing infections. So just being kind of aware, dogs should go out and should urinate in one spot. Maybe they'll sniff at a second, but a dog that goes out in the grass or is on a walk, even, and when when she walks, she urinates and then urinates and urinates that you know 15 times. That's urge incontinence. Um, and that happens in dogs, cats, women, horses, it doesn't matter. Um, that that feeling of needing to go, even though the bladder is empty, that's really powerful. It's a powerful urge in the brain. And so these dogs will try to urinate 15 different spots. That's not normal and it needs to be checked out. If they urinate in your house and you see blood or any really any kind of abnormal urinary behavior, I would have that checked out by your by your general practice.

SPEAKER_02 8:38

And do you think senior pets just are more likely to develop something like that?

SPEAKER_01 8:43

No, not necessarily. Now, in males, they're a little bit different because their stone formation, when it happens, is caused by metabolic abnormalities most of the time. These are not the same stones that females get, which are called struvite. In males, we generally see calcium oxalate. Some dogs will have cysteine. They are caused by metabolic pathways that do tend to occur a little bit later. Sometimes they happen early. Those are also treated long term with diet, sometimes successfully, sometimes not so successfully. And they have to have repeat systotomies to remove those stones.

SPEAKER_02 9:23

And any breeds more prone to in cats or dogs more prone to these issues?

SPEAKER_01 9:30

Not that I have seen. There are certain breeds, and I would honestly have to look it up, uh, as to which ones are more prone to have calcium oxalate and which breeds are more prone to have cysteine stones. Again, those are generally smaller dogs. Doesn't tend to be a big dog problem, uh, but it it certainly could potentially happen in anybody. And urine attract infection and struvite stones in females can definitely happen in in huge dogs or in small dogs.

SPEAKER_02 10:00

And we just spoke about congestive heart failure. Would you say that urinary issues are what are the more and you were saying that you may have seen maybe 40 to 50 patients in a year? What about this um issue? Is this really common, like all across the board?

SPEAKER_01 10:16

Urinary issues across the board are extremely common. I I probably see, oh, I'd say four or five of those a week.

SPEAKER_02 10:23

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 10:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:25

In dogs and cats?

SPEAKER_01 10:27

In dogs and cats. I fortunately only see uh block toms, um, which is how we refer to those urethral obstructions. I would say on average we see one of those a week.

SPEAKER_02 10:38

Wow. Okay, well, um, I want to thank you so much, Doctor, for sharing this very important information. We always appreciate your expertise.

SPEAKER_01 10:46

Thank you.

Final Stats And How To Reach Us

SPEAKER_00 10:52

Thank you for listening to the Frisco Emergency Pet Care Podcast. To learn more, visit FriscoPetER.com. Call 469-287-6767. Or stop by 11201 Preston Road, Frisco, Texas, 75033. Open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Frisco Emergency Pet Care is always here when your pet needs us most. Until next time, take care of your pets, and they'll take care of you.