Expert: Jessica - 12/8/2009

Question
Recently my husband and I found an old and sick female Chartreux cat trying to escape the cold by hiding in a gas station. We felt so bad and couldn't bear to leave her there. We took her home and fed her (she was starving!!) and the next day took her to the vet. They told us that she is in her late teens if not 20 years old and that she has Feline Leukemia... We assume she has lived with people before, as she is well mannered and loves to lay in your lap or follow you around but we don't know how long she has been outside or an outside cat. The vet told us from now on it would be better for her to be strictly an inside cat to prevent spreading the FL to other non-vaccinated cats. Heres the problem, she won't use her litter box. For the first few days we kept her completely isolated from the other animals (two dogs and a cat) because of her cold, so she has her own room and her own litter box. I showed her where it was and have followed the basic "How to teach your kitten to use the litter box" guidelines and I continue to clean the 'accident spots' with an enzyme cleaner for pets but I am getting tired of cleaning and stressing and I don't want to give her to someone who might not understand her or put her to sleep or anything! Once she got over her cold we learned that she gets along amazingly well with the other animals and has no problems jumping up on the table or up into your lap or anything... she runs to the door or down the hall at your heels so I don't think it's an arthritis problem... I don't know what to do! It would be a shame to not try and fix this litter box problem and I don't want to keep stressing over keeping her isolated because of it.  
Thanks so much for taking the time to help,     Jesse

Answer
Hi Jesse.  Thanks for taking in this poor girl!

I would recommend to use a training litter with her.  There is one formulated with an herbal attractant by a veterinarian, which guarantees 100% litter box usage, or your money back.  It's called Cat Attract, and you can find a retailer at www.preciouscat.com.  If you can't find a retailer near you, there is also a Cat Attract additive that you put in your own litter.  It can be ordered through various websites and is much less expensive to ship than the litter.  However, you must use it with only unscented clumping litter.

Unfortunately, confining cats to a small area until they have gotten the hang of using the litter box is a big part of litter training.  Is there any way you could rent a dog crate for a couple of weeks to keep her in most of the time, and allow her to come out only when she'll be closely supervised?  She's more likely to start using a litter box if going outside it will create an undesirable situation for her (for example, it would soil her personal living space in a dog crate).

I'm guessing that your own cat has been vaccinated against FeLV.  This vaccine is around 80% effective, meaning that about 2 out of 10 cats won't be protected by it.  So segregation is still certainly the safest way to go if there is any possibility of reserving a section of the house for her alone.  If she had an in-office test, called an ELISA, there is actually a possibility that she may fight off the virus.  40-60% of cats do.  You can either repeat the test in 3 months to see if she tests negative, or you can ask your vet to run what's called an IFA test now.  This will tell you if she still has any chance of fighting off the virus.  If the IFA test is negative, she may fight off the virus, and you should retest with either an ELISA or an IFA in 3 months.

Best regards,
Jessica