Pill Pockets - A Miracle for Cat Lovers

If you've ever had to give a cat a pill, you know how difficult it can be, especially if it's a maintenance drug or a course of medication that must be given over several days.

Finding Pill Pockets was a blessing. Our cat Quinn had gone through six months of heart medications, sometimes multiple pills several times a day, and many times he would run from us, even when we just wanted to pet him. It was heartbreaking, so when his littermate Remy was diagnosed with a heart murmur, we were so afraid he'd start to fear us as well.

Thankfully, by then we had found Pill Pockets. Made by an independent company at that time, Pill Pockets are now made by Greenies. Here's the way it works: Pill Pockets are very soft and malleable. It's shaped like a cup, so you can drop a pill in, however if you try to hide a whole pill in a full Pocket, unless your cat has a large mouth, s/he may have trouble chewing and swallowing it all.

Remy only has to take one quarter of a small pill per day, and we can easily hide it in half a Pocket. He's been on the medication for about five years and only recently did he begin turning up his nose at the Salmon and Chicken flavors. Fortunately, Greenies, which makes the pockets, has added a new Duck flavor, and he likes that just fine, so far.

We currently have nine cats, and we use the Pill Pockets for their regular worm treatments as well. Those are larger pills, so we quarter them and hide the pieces in half-Pockets. Same with allergy medicines.


It's very easy to break the Pockets into smaller pieces and press them around a small pill or piece of pill. The cat smells only the treat, grabs it, it's very chewy, and they usually don't notice the pill at all. Whole pills, though, tend to get bitten into, meaning the cat tastes the pill and spits it out. That's why we break larger pills apart now.

On the whole, I highly recommend Pill Pockets for helping the medicine go down. By the way, they're also available for dogs.