Lennie is a 9 year old DSH cat who presented to our clinic for hair loss over the abdomen. Lennie’s owner reported that he had always had hair loss on his belly from the day they adopted him from the shelter. This can occur due to stress, allergies, atopy, or even bladder pain. At the first visit, there were a lot of crusts on his belly and legs which can indicate a skin infection. Skin infections are itchy and we have to clear that up before we can start looking for the root cause of the hair loss on his belly. We treated Lennie with antibiotics and steroids which improved the crusts and his hair started to grow back. At a recheck we did a skin scrape to look for mites and a trial treatment of Bravecto to ensure fleas and other bugs were not causing an allergic reaction. Nothing seemed to work as well as the steroids and when we tried to decrease the dose he would start to lose hair again. Steroids can have lots of side effects when used long term including harming the skin barrier so that it gets infected, increased thirst and urination, and diabetes. We started Lennie on a safer long term drug that will suppress his body’s overactive immune system without all those other side effects. Lennie is doing welll on cyclosporine today and he will likely need it for his whole life. We will monitor his organ function regularly to ensure he can continue to process this medication but his atopy or atopic dermatitis is now controlled.