How Does Heartworm Affect Cats?
The most common symptoms include:
- Chronic vomiting
- Difficult or fast breathing
- Coughing
- Reduced activity
- Open mouth breathing
- Off-color gums
Another common scenario is that the infected cat shows no signs at all (termed "subclinical"). Note that many subclinical cases may go on to develop full blown symptoms.
Finally, in some cases the parasite may result in sudden death. In this situation the cat likely will have been harboring the parasite, but had been able to compensate for the inflammation in the lungs and not display obvious symptoms until a later stage of the disease