Hello to the whole community. I’ve just joined this exciting group. I read that some dog and cat owners were giving rapamycin. My 15 year old cat has a squamous cell carcinoma, which is affecting his jaw. To help him, I’d like to give him rapamycin. But like many of you, I’m struggling with how to dose and how to cycle it in the context of a cancer. If you have any data or scientific references to help me, I’d be very grateful 
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It has not dawned on me to consider giving it to my cats and I’m following this closely. I have seniors in great health, and one with CKD, heart disease, and a tumor in his mouth they won’t operate on or even biopsy… and then another with mast cell cancer…
I will be interested with what the brilliant people here say regarding potentially making the diseases worse?
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I have two cats that are rescue cats that were in the wild for a while and were semi-feral when they were adopted. I managed to get them to take a few doses when they were kittens. Now that they are grown I cannot get them to take any rapamycin no matter what I have tried so far, pill pocket treats, etc.
The cats are too smart for me. They manage to eat the pill pocket treats while spitting the rapamycin tablets out. When I crush rapamycin and mix it with their favorite pet food they won’t touch it.
They are very nice cats but will put up too much of a fight to force-feed them the pills.
Because they were semi-feral cats, to begin with, and required patience to adapt them to a home environment, I don’t like to do anything that traumatizes them.
Any suggestions on how to get my cats to take the small rapaycin pills would be appreciated
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Rapamycin doses for cancer is very high (or at least can be very high, I suspect it varies by type of cancer). You can see in this human study they were dosing as high as 90mg/day:
The target sirolimus area under the concentration curve (AUC) of 3810 ng-hr/ml was achieved at sirolimus doses of 90 mg, 16 mg, and 25 mg in the sirolimus alone, sirolimus plus ketoconazole, and sirolimus plus grapefruit juice studies, respectively.
See this study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4410974/
And there are significant side effects. There is the additional issue of how to translate these doses to cats… I imagine you could work backwards from these animal to human calculations provided here:
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There are many ideas and suggestions on how to get your cats to take rapamycin pills in this thread: Rapamycin for my Cats?
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Yes, I have followed that thread for quite some time. I will revisit the pill-hiding suggestions, which worked for a while when my cats were kittens. What I was hoping for was an original or unique method, which probably doesn’t exist.
Some of the pill-hiding mediums suggested are not readily available in the U.S.
I will try some of the other pill-hiding mediums that I have found online.
What doesn’t work with my cats is coating the pills with INABA Churu Cat Treats or Greenie pill pockets. They always manage to separate the pills from the treats.
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FINALLY, I can contribute something of value to the someone in this forum!!!
Unfortunately, I have recently become an EXPERT pill giver. In a bit I will come back and tell you what I’ve done… no one thing works for all, but hopefully I can assist.
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Thank you very much, I’m just reading the 1st study and, indeed, the side effects are quite significant and it would be quite difficult to undertake a protocol without medical supervision by a vet (not to mention the stress for the cat who has to undergo tests).
So I’m wondering whether, at lower and tolerable doses, any “slowing down” effects can be observed. This may not stop the cancer progression but it will at least slow it down as much as possible.
Put another way, can a tolerable dose without huge side effects be effective or is it just useless ? But perhaps there’s no answer to that question yet, given the current data.
I thought crushing the pill up is not ideal even for cats. How about make something your cats like such as something sweeter or saltier? Just a small portion. I know my cat prefer sweeter or saltier food. I also know they are not the best for them.
I would suspect the answer is yes on that. I would recommend you search on the specific cancer your cat has and “rapamycin” and see what tests have been done so far (probably in humans).
There is a perhaps slightly similar situation with the person who discovered rapamycin; Suren Seghal. He had colon cancer and since he was a biochemist and was studying rapamycin, decided to take it himself. he believed it helped stop the cancer for many years. Then he stopped taking it to see what would happen, the cancer came back and sadly he died. See this thread: Suren Sehgal's self treatment rapamycin dose regime for colon cancer?
This is a lot, but hopefully there is something for you to glean from this novel, stained with my blood sweat and tears.
I’ve had medicine compounded into a tuna flavored liquid that I would mix with tuna juice (liquid from salt free human canned tuna). I would have the medicine done in a super concentrated formula instead of relying on their much bigger dose supplied with their flavorings. This worked some of the time.
Pills in hidden in churu tuna goop have never worked for my cats more than once or twice because they could smell/taste the pills.
My cats have never been willing to eat Greenies pill pockets, but until that fateful day my cat bit into his pill pocket and foamed at the mouth when tasting the hidden pill, one of them LOVED Royal Canin Pill Assist for Cats. They are harder to find.
One cat would eat pills hidden inside Churu Bites (you sorta stick the pills into the soft center). This worked until the cat one day bit into the pill.
https://www.chewy.com/inaba-churu-bites-chicken-recipe/dp/262444
My vet taught me to pill using a pill gun which worked for me, but it also ruined our relationship because my cat feared me. (RapaAdmin just posted one, silicone soft tip)
The vet taught me to be behind the cat and stick the gun into the side of her mouth. This prevented the stress of seeing something coming straight at her face.
I was then turned onto these vetoquinol pill wraps that work, and, knock on wood, are still working. But, I do doctor up the wraps…
https://www.chewy.com/vetoquinol-pill-wrap-dogs-cats/dp/102186
I was coating them in Purina Fortiflora that most cats love. It’s a low quality probiotic, but the taste drives many cats wild (supposedly it’s the flavor they spray onto kibble). When my cat eventually bit into the pill, he stopped liking fortiflora
https://www.chewy.com/purina-pro-plan-veterinary-diets/dp/49853
Then I was coating the wrap with nutritional yeast which a lot of cats love… until he bit into a pill… kill me
Drum roll….
Then I learned to put any pills given into empty gelcaps!!!
This tip changed my life. The cat almost never smells or tastes anything which makes it easier to hide pills into treats/pockets etc. This means that, at least so far, the cat never gets turned off to a particular treat/coating. (When wet, these gelcaps dissolve quickly, so it behooves you to get said gelcap into said cat before your cover is blown).
I think it’s also kinder to use a gelcap when pilling them with the gun, because even if successful, they never have to have a bitter taste stuck in their mouth which makes it easier when you need to do it again. If pilling, I coat the gelcap with pork fat or butter to help it slide down.
I have a variety of gelcap sizes. 5 are my smallest, but if I have a wider pill, instead of cutting it up into many pieces to stick it into the size 5, I’ll put those in a larger cap and cut the half shorter and then put the top cap back on and create a little round pill vs an oversized oval that is too big.
Even if I have to pill a cat these days, which is rare, because they don’t smell/taste anything, while they don’t like what just happened, they really don’t understand what I did.
If you are looking for a slow release empty gel cap for rapa, I found these when buying something else from them. From what I know, they are a trustworthy company. I saw someone else posted about them in another thread
(Regular gelcaps on amazon are dirt cheap, btw)
Putting pills into gelcaps and hiding them in treats is going to be the most economical method. If my day wasn’t filled with giving pills, it’s what I’d still do.
I buried the lead…
After trying multiple compounding pharmacies and even the famous wedgewood (my cats wouldn’t take one thing from them), a few months ago I discovered Mix Lab.
I can not say enough good things about their service and product. They are quick to respond and you can text and ask if they can compound rapa.
My #1 life changing medicine product is their “Micro” tuna chew because it’s the smallest thing I’ve ever seen. Pure sorcery! (See below image).
For one cat, I put multiple micro chews into the vetoquinol pill wrap, then I coat the sticky wrap in powdered chicken liver (because he still doesn’t want to eat the wrap as is), then I put that wrap on top of a tiny bed of bonito flakes and a couple of other treats, and then he inhales it. Aside from liking it, a bed of flakes helps get whatever is on top of it into his mouth because it keeps anything from sticking to the plate and getting pushed around as he’s licking. This method would still work with a pill inside of a gelcap, but this is easier due to the tiny size and how many pills I need to give him multiple times per day.
My other cat gets her micro chews into a blob of delectables goop, with no wrap (delectables, because as noted about, pill tastes have ruined the churu option) and a little liver power on top of the goop blob. The powder gives it a little grip to prevent her from just licking everything and accidentally leaving pills on the plate
Here is a visual of a couple of their chews. (Even if they don’t compound rapa, they might come in handy for something else one day. So far, with success, I have gotten chews for prednisone, telmisartan, palladia, cerenia, gabapentin, and clopidogrel. One day I even stuck a bunch of the micro chews into an empty gel cap.
I still want to explore the rapa for cats question, but with their multiple comorbidities, and knowing I shouldn’t take rapa if I get sick, I’m not sure what might be a contraindication
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Great, thanks for the info, I’ll be looking into it ! 
Thanks! Lots of good ideas.
I am going to try the enteric-coated pills. I am adept at working with small things.
Since the capsules are enteric-coated I can split the rapamycin pills in two and insert them into the caps. Then I will coat them with Churu.
I am looking for something the cats will just eat without being forced.
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Fwiw, I bought this to help… (i was also filling capsules with powders, but now the main thing that helps me is the little stick thing to help push pills deep into the cap (that way I can cut the caps and make them smaller)
Yeah, agree…I was only forcing cancer medicine until I discovered the new methods. I’d never choose to force anything not medically necessary
Good luck!!
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I do that and use the same enteric coated capsule for my somewhat picky 5kg dog who was also feral and separates most pill 
coverings. Seems to work well. I wrap the cap in gooey cheese and am quick to follow up with two more pieces so he swallows the first to get ti the 2nd and 3rd.
Have not researched squamous cell in felines, but have researched osteosarcoma (less than successful study funded by Morris Animal) and canine melanoma which was concurrently dosed with carboplatin.
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I have a 15 year old rat terrier dog with cardiomyopathy and cancer…and give her 1/2 to 1/3 of 1mg every other day…but once cancer is present cancer is difficult to manage…R is good for reducing the onset…but not very effective except at high doses to slow cancers growth. High in people means 90mg daily and not the anti aging dose I’ve taken for the last 6 years.
Low does versions of it is good for cardio myopathy as it triggers autophagy that slows this heart condition.
Cancer…another matter.
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be good if i can just feed it to my cat… keep her a little more docile on the days she is on rapa … but my cat is so fussy i dont know how to make her eat it.
there is nothing wrong with my cat… just that it would be good to give it to her to prevent cancer and other age related ailments.
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My cats are rescued semi-feral cats. While they are friendly and like to be petted, they will tolerate no restraint, so I can’t force-feed them a pill. It amazes me that no matter how I disguise the pill they manage to reject it.
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