Why 'seems fine' is the finding to distrust most
Cats are built to survive falls remarkably well, and also built to conceal injury: a prey animal's instinct is to behave normally while hurt, and owners routinely meet a purring, walking cat whose fall has caused damage that declares itself hours later. Falls from windows, balconies, and roofs can injure the chest, jaw, palate, and limbs in patterns that are not obvious from across a room. So the working rule after any real height is simple: her apparent fine-ness buys you a calm journey to advice, not a decision to skip it. The height she fell, the surface she landed on, and how she behaves over the next day are the facts that matter.
The first hour: confine, observe, handle gently
Bring her indoors and settle her in one quiet room rather than letting her roam the house, so her movement, appetite, and litter use can actually be observed. Handle her as little and as gently as possible — support her whole body if she must be moved, and do not press on her chest or abdomen to test for pain. Watch her breathing at rest: rapid, shallow, or effortful breathing after a fall is an emergency sign, not a wait-and-see one. Look at her mouth if she allows it, since falls commonly split the palate or damage teeth and the jaw, and check how she walks for any favouring of a leg before she settles and stiffens.
Phone a vet the same day, even if she is purring
Call your vet — or the emergency clinic if it is out of hours — and describe the estimated height, the landing surface, and exactly how she is behaving now. That conversation sorts falls into 'come in now' and 'watch at home with these specific checks' far better than any home assessment, and clinics would always rather hear about a fall early than meet its complications late. If she shows any of the following, skip the phone triage and go in: breathing changes, bleeding from the mouth or nose, collapse or wobbliness, crying when moving, not bearing weight on a leg, or a swollen, tense abdomen. Bring her in a secure carrier lined with a towel, keeping her level and warm.
The following day is part of the incident
Some fall injuries evolve slowly — bruising deepens, a sore chest makes breathing shallower by degrees, a cat with a painful jaw simply stops eating and is misread as shock. Keep her confined and indoors for at least a full day, note whether she eats, drinks, urinates, and jumps as usual, and re-check her gait in the evening and the next morning. Any decline, however mild it seems, goes back to the vet with the fall as the headline fact. If she was seen and sent home, follow the clinic's recheck instructions exactly rather than cancelling because she looks brighter.
Then close the route she fell from
Once she is safe, identify precisely where she fell — a window without a secure screen, a balcony gap, a roof reached from a fence — and fix that route before she has access again, because cats return to favourite high places without any memory of the fall as a warning. A fitted window screen, balcony netting secured at every edge, or a blocked first step to the roof belongs on the same week's list, not the someday list. KinsLe's Pet Passport keeps this cat's records together in one portable packet, so whichever vet assesses her after a fall — her own clinic or an emergency service meeting her for the first time — can see her history, vaccinations, and conditions without delay.