Cat has bump on face...

July 16, 2021 6:43 AM

We're going to the vet next week, but I am hoping that other mefites will have some experiences to share.

Our cat has suddenly developed a round, firm, pale bump on her face about 2mm across and raised 1mm. I could not get a good photo - it is among her whiskers between her nose and mouth. It is not crusted, irregular, pitted or bleeding. It does not appear to hurt when I touch it although she does not like having me poke at her beautiful cat face.

We noticed it yesterday and it seems not to have changed overnight.

We are going to the vet next week, assuming nothing changes, but I am wondering whether anyone's cats have had anything similar. The vet will need to look and presumably biopsy, but still: anything similar? What kind of treatments and prices were you looking at? What kinds of outcomes?

posted by Frowner to Pets & Animals (11 answers total)

My dog has one of these on his shoulder. Started small, grew to a nub the approximate size and shape of a worn pencil eraser. My vet assures me it's completely benign, just unsightly. It kind of got to one size and then stopped.

Obviously dogs and cats are not the same thing, and absolutely go to the vet for a professional opinion, but in my experience, for a growth that presented exactly the same way, the answer was this is not dangerous or harmful, it causes him no pain, it's not a problem, do absolutely nothing. Any removal would be entirely aesthetic.

His modeling career is over.
posted by phunniemee at 6:48 AM on July 16, 2021 [4 favorites]

Could it be a tick?
posted by carmicha at 7:10 AM on July 16, 2021 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Further info: our cat is indoor-only and 11 years old. I'm worried that it's a mast cell tumor.
posted by Frowner at 7:15 AM on July 16, 2021

Can you tell whether it is "loose" under the skin or not? Although it's a pretty awkward place to check, it might be a cyst. Our dog has hundreds ranging from tiny little bumps to big round lumps, that just look like pink skin when you look at them . The vet called them infundibular cysts and said they were harmless. They wax and wane in number and size but he never seems bothered by them. Their main characteristic is that you can effectively lift them gently away from his body as they are within the skin itself and not fixed to any underlying structures.

I hope your jolly good floof is ok.
posted by Martha My Dear Prudence at 9:00 AM on July 16, 2021 [1 favorite]

It's very possibly just a little cyst. My kitty got one on her forehead within the last year, which our vet said was harmless and quite common. (We found it when we were checking for ticks and thought it WAS a tick and tried to remove it. Didn't remove. We felt awful.)

The weird kink, though, was that it keratinized (basically turned itself into the kind of harder material that makes up her paw pads, which is where the vet said those usually grow). Smack in the middle of her forehead, it looked like she was sprouting a unicorn horn and we teased her about it a lot. The vet said we could get it removed if we were really worried about it, but that she didn't think it was harmful (and removing it would have cost $1,000 so we said we'd let it be for now). Within the last couple weeks, it suddenly got SMALLER, and we think that a layer of it must have loosened and she scraped it off.
posted by dlugoczaj at 9:34 AM on July 16, 2021 [1 favorite]

it could be almost anything. when my boy had a bump growing on his chin, the first response--which i agreed with--was watch and wait. after a couple of months it had grown more than i felt was reasonable, so we went in to have it removed. they removed the whole thing with good margins--just in case--and sent it out for pathology with my approval. it turned out to be cancer, but they got the whole thing. so i got a call saying "franklin's bump was cancer, but we got it all with large margins, and recurrence is unlikely." so i didn't even have the stress of thinking my boy had cancer for a few days!

edit: i'm in michigan, this was last year, and it cost less than $300 for everything.
posted by misanthropicsarah at 10:06 AM on July 16, 2021 [1 favorite]

I agree with misanthropicsarah, it could be almost anything. My 18-year-old cat developed a small, raised bump on her side a few months ago. It didn't seem to bother her, wasn't bleeding, and she seemed otherwise healthy. We took her to the vet, who said it was likely either a skin tag (which are quite common in older cats) or a pimple (cats apparently can get those!) We've kept an eye on it, and it isn't changing size or shape. Our cat continues to do fine. It's a great idea to take your cat to the vet to rule out anything serious, but try not to panic in the meantime.
posted by firemonkey at 10:45 AM on July 16, 2021

Cats can get acne, particularly if they have a plastic food dish. The vet will tell you if it's "catne" or not, and if it is, it's an easy treatment and a switch to stainless steel bowls.
posted by essexjan at 12:05 PM on July 16, 2021

My cat had a cyst on her lip that sounds like it was similar. They drained it at the vet and it cost about $60. I’m not recommending you do this since taking the cat to the vet is always safer, but for our cat, when it filled up again in the future, I disinfected it with some rubbing alcohol and lanced it with a little diabetic fingerstick lancet and drained it at home for $0 and she was fine.
posted by music for skeletons at 12:30 PM on July 16, 2021 [1 favorite]

Could be a benign cyst all the way up to cancer. There is no way to tell without the vet cutting/drain and do a biopsy by taking the remains to a lab for analysis. Chances are it'd be benign though. Stop worrying over it.
posted by kschang at 3:54 PM on July 16, 2021

cats can get zits
posted by Jacqueline at 4:18 AM on July 21, 2021