Yes, it's a possibility. But frankly, what does it matter if nobody's going to put the time or energy into getting food into her? Even if she doesn't have HL, starvation is going to kill her one way or another.

Laurie

One of my cats had fatty liver disease a few years back. From what the vet said, there's usually an underlying cause for the cat to stop eating (i.e. some other health issue), and then when they stop eating and lose a lot of weight, you run the risk of getting fatty liver disease. We never discovered what caused our cat to stop eating, but a few months of care brought her out of it -- it required putting a feeding tube in her neck, and feeding her through it 4 times a day, as well as various medications. It was not easy, but with a lot of love, we pulled her through it.

The two symptoms (besides the weight loss) that were really obvious with my cat were that she was vomiting bile, and her skin was really jaundiced (really noticeable in her ears). Does the cat in question have those symptoms?

Have to agree with laurie, though -- if she does have fatty liver disease, it seems unlikely that the cat will pull through it. It takes a lot of effort to pull a cat through it, and it doesn't sound like the shelter you're dealing with is equipped to do that.

This cat does not have those two symptoms (at least not that I know of) but the 9 mth old that was euthanized did have jaundiced skin (and if I knew what he'd had at the time and that he could have been saved, I would have sneaked out of the shelter with him and took him how and cared for him. )

I had the exact same experience as rivkadr with my Boris. I know what started it - I was trying to transition him to a better quality wet food from the meat flavored cereal he'd been eating his whole life. He turned up his nose but I figured when he got hungry enough he'd eat. Wrong answer. I did not realize how much weight he'd lost until I found him limp and almost unresponsive on my closet floor. I was shocked when I picked him up, he was a bag of bones. I missed this mostly because he never was a cuddly cat, very aloof, and I just never handled him much. He was so jaundiced it looked like someone had colored the skin around the inside of his ears with a yellow highlighter. We got a feeding tube inserted into his neck and I had to syringe feed him pureed food and meds 4-5 times a day, at first he would projectile vomit the few cc's I could get into him right back up. Not fun. I also had to give him sub-Q fluids twice a day. He was so weak the first few weeks he couldn't stand and needless to say needed a lot of bathing. I remember crying my head off the first time I saw him eat again on his own. He is once again fat and happy, eating his meat flavored cereal - and has turned into a real lover boy. He's curled up next to me as I write this. Fatty liver is really hard and expensive to get through but I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

She may not have hepatic lipidosis yet, but she's a high risk for it. The longer she doesn't eat, the higher the risk. IV fluids will not prevent the cat from going into HL; she needs FOOD. The vet should be able to place an esophageal feeding tube very easily, it's a very easy and fast surgical procedure requiring only 1 suture to hold the tube in place. Once the cat is sedated or anesthetized, placing the tube shouldn't take more than 5 minutes. Or the vet should order syringe-feeding for the cat, making sure to specify the daily metabolic requirements so she gets all the nutrition she needs. Giving her a couple os syringe-fulls of food twice a day isn't going to cut it; she probably needs 1.25-1.5 cans a day of a high fat food like a/d unless she is a tiny cat. If the shelter can't commit to getting the cat fed, then they should euthanize her now rather than let her suffer through starvation or HL.