Henry's Thread

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JaneDoe

Post   » Sat Mar 14, 2009 4:27 am


Glad he's doing better.

Nhburritt

Post   » Sat Mar 14, 2009 11:03 pm


I was reading back through the history and noticed the comments about antibiotics and stones. I had the same thought because my pig got his first stone when he was 5 years old and it was about 5 1/2 months after he had received antibiotics. He had never taken antibiotics before that time in his life. And nothing about his diet had been changed. He's now had a total of 3 stones in less than one year, all of which have been surgically removed. It's so frustrating. I just don't know what to do anymore. He was getting polycitra syrup and subq injections. Something interesting though, his first two stones were calcium carbonate but the third one appears to be calcium oxalate. I've sent it for analysis. I wonder if the polycitra changed the urine composition and therefore changed the stone makeup but it wasn't enought to stop the formation completely. Ugh.

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rshevin

Post   » Sat Mar 14, 2009 11:16 pm


Do you remember which antibiotic he was given before the first stone incident?

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Sun Mar 15, 2009 10:37 am


It could be happenstance.

To know for sure, you'd also need to have xrayed his bladder before and after (periodically through his life) to see if there were deposits or stones that did not cause problems already present.

It's tough for us because things like this, we are only guessing and don't know without more information.

I am hoping for the best for him.

Nhburritt

Post   » Sun Mar 15, 2009 1:08 pm


I know it could be just a coincidence but it does make me wonder. He was given Baytril. I found this article online that I thought was interesting. What do you guys think?

http://www.renalandurologynews.com/Oxal ... %20-%2056k

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Sun Mar 15, 2009 2:41 pm


Very interesting. This refers to kidney stones in humans (it is bladder stones that plague guinea pigs most often). It would be helpful to know if oxalobacter formigenes are present in guinea pigs. Stones are quite complicated though. There is likely a genetic component. What works for humans may not work for guinea pigs. I found several interesting articles on humans. Here are a couple of them:

http://www.healthbasis.com/In-Depth%20R ... 000081.htm

http://www.centurahealthinfo.org/In-Dep ... 000081.htm

TwoWhitePiggies

Post   » Sun Mar 15, 2009 3:08 pm


A quick update on Henry: Friday night, he ate very slowly, but he finished all of his food (we had to take Frost out for a while to give Henry a chance to eat). Yesterday he was eating better. He keeps going to the hay pile, and you can see he really wants to eat hay, but his mouth just isn't quite up to it yet. Same goes with the water bottles. He will drink water in a bowl, but I don't want him to get into the habit of that.

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Bugs Mom

Post   » Sun Mar 15, 2009 3:28 pm


I'm glad Henry is still making progress. Come on sweet boy-you can do it!

Tracis
Let Sleeping Pigs Lie

Post   » Sun Mar 15, 2009 5:24 pm


Sending more good thoughts for Henry!

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Bytxlaura
Remembering Nemo

Post   » Mon Mar 16, 2009 12:22 am


C'mon Henry, you can do it sweet boy!

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TWP_2

Post   » Fri Mar 20, 2009 2:03 am


Henry's eating is picking back up, but he has dropped down to just under 1 lb 6 oz as of this evening (3/19). We gave him a bath--he's been sleeping in one spot when he isn't out and about, he's probably trying to stay warm with so little body fat on him.

The good news is that he has started to eat dry pellets and drink more water. The bad news is, obviously, his weight. We gave him a bath tonight, and he seems to feel better now (he likes to be clean).

We're still working on trying to find higher calorie diet to help him out. We're giving him plenty of pellets--he is eating them with more vigor. I'm going to be trying to get him a meal of sweet potato and celery, parsley, or papaya to boost his calorie intake.

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TWP_2

Post   » Fri Mar 20, 2009 4:40 am


If I read the charts right, lettuce is about 15 Calories per 100 grams. They get about 20 grams of lettuce per meal, so that works out to about three Calories of lettuce per meal.

Giving Henry 4 grams of sweet potato should be a hair over 4 Calories. That's about one 3 mL syringe full. He LOVES it. He got about three grams of kale to keep the Ca:P ratio in a good range, there's another calorie or so.

We're going to try supplementing him twice a day with this and see what happens.

Does anyone know a verifiable value for either the daily Calorie needs for guinea pigs, or for the calorie value they get from eating hay? Since Henry isn't eating much hay right now, we want to supplement his diet to make up for that AND give him extra calories on top of that.

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