Excessive weight gain

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Wed Nov 29, 2006 9:03 pm


That poor little pig (with the stuck wood chip -- didn't have time to read closely when I skimmed it before). I would think with the teeth trim and metacalm, he should start eating in a reasonable amount of time. I imagine you are really pushing the food (you mentioned hand feeding). Bigger images would be great. If you care to send me anything to post, you can try this email:

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Pigginess
You are my sunshine

Post   » Thu Nov 30, 2006 2:48 am


Thanks Kallie for the photos of Timmy's mouth. They are fascinating.

I never cease to be amazed at the diverse ailments that afflict guinea pigs!

I learn so much reading the forums here and sometimes cry and sometimes even laugh!

capybara
Supporter in '13

Post   » Thu Nov 30, 2006 6:09 pm


I hope poor Timmy is feeling better today. That wood chip looked really painful! He's very cute, and him dragging the duck toy around sounds adorable! I hope when he's feeling better you can get a video of it for us, please!!

User avatar
Kallie

Post   » Thu Nov 30, 2006 9:55 pm


We've managed to get Timmy's weight back up to 1333 grams tonight. We've been hand feeding 10-15cc's of CC and 10-15cc's of water every 2 hours. He's still not drinking or eating hay on his own, but will eat the leafy soft parts of hay if I hand feed them to him. Still not drinking from the water bottle or bowl either and he wouldn't touch the Pedialyte.

His lack of pooping is really concerning me though. The few poops he does have are near normal size, but the most he's done at one time is 13 poops.. for him, that's not normal and about half the amount as usual. He will be going back to the vets either tomorrow night or Saturday morning if he doesn't make a big improvement

Also, just so you know, that wood chip came from a log cave we had in his cage, not from wood chip bedding. The cave is a bunch of branches attached together with wire, in which you shape into a cave. They're meant to be chewed on and for hiding. The cave was a gift I bought him when we adopted him, so I'm feeling quite guilty right now. We've since removed them from all the cages. All our pigs, including fosters are all housed on fleece.

User avatar
Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Thu Nov 30, 2006 10:36 pm



User avatar
Kallie

Post   » Wed Jan 28, 2009 2:57 am


Thankfully it’s been a very long time since I’ve had to add or update anything in Timmy’s medical file, but here we go again with teeth issues. Sorry this will likely be a very long post.

The beginning of January I noticed Timmy wasn’t eating as much or at the same speed or way he usually does. He couldn’t grab a hold of food nor bite into anything. The night before, he was eating perfectly fine. We got him into the first available appointment January 6th. The vet used the scope and found out his molars were slightly over grown, which is very unusual considering how he eats. She filed his molars down and we thought that would be the end of the problem.

We had him on Metacam for a week, did hand feeding until he could eat fully on his own. This never happened. We noticed he could eat just fine if he could get the food behind his front teeth, but still couldn’t close his jaw or bite into anything with his front teeth. We brought him back to the vets on January 14th to have him looked at again. His mouth and teeth looked fine and couldn’t find any reason why he couldn’t bite into anything, so we were told to keep him on the Metacam, keep up with the hand feeding as needed since it was only 1 week since he had the filing done and being an older pampered pig, he might be just taking longer to bounce back. My instincts kept nagging me that something else was wrong.

He went back to the vet’s yesterday (January 27th) for full dental xrays and it was discovered that he has a first pre-molar root abscess which needed immediate surgery for, which was done. The surgery took 2 hours to complete, but Dr. Munn was able to get everything out. She had to also drill holes in his jaw bone to get everything out and removed the molar. She also mentioned this was one of the hardest Guinea Pig surgeries she’s ever had to do. He had a bit of a hard time coming out of the anesthetic, but he did sit up about 60 minutes later, much to our relief. He stayed over night and hopefully will be able to come home tonight.

Dr. Munn has him on Tramadol(?) for pain and Baytril. She said she’d be up all night hand feeding him small amounts to help keep his belly moving. She also mentioned that he’ll be on pain killers and AB’s for at least a month with extensive hand feeding. I have no problem with doing this. We were warned that the first 24 hours is critical and if he makes it through this time, he has a good chance for a full recovery. I’m terrified for him and have been up most of the night with worry.

My questions are, he’s 6-7 years old and on Enalapril for an enlarged heart. What things do I need to watch out for him? Signs of infection etc. He’s a tough little guy who rarely shows signs of being sick, I only notice something is wrong when his eating habits change. I’m told I need to keep flushing the holes out, so what do I need to buy for this before I bring him home? How can I flush him without him choking? Other then pain meds, hand feeding, AB’s and flushing, is there anything else I’ll need to do for him to make him comfortable and to make sure he recovers? Obviously he’ll be weighed daily too. Oh and through all of this ordeal, we’ve managed to maintain his weight!

Thanks so much for any and all advice.

User avatar
Lovemypig

Post   » Wed Jan 28, 2009 8:29 am


How upsetting to read about my favorite guy. Hopefully someone will have some ideas about flushing out the wound without choking him. I just want to send my best wishes for him today. Timmy, hang in there.

User avatar
Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Wed Jan 28, 2009 10:13 am


I'm sorry about your little guy. Exactly where are the holes? Would you be flushing from the outside into the jaw? I'm a little unclear (maybe a photo with an x on where you are supposed to flush from).

I'm thinking you would need a curved tip syringe. Flush only a small amount at a time, a weak, warm sterile saline solution.
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User avatar
Kallie

Post   » Thu Jan 29, 2009 3:26 am


Timmy came home with us last night. I have copies of his xrays which I will scan tonight after work and will post them. This is far worse then what I expected, but I think it’s something we can handle. Right now he has a hole approx 2 inches long just under his chin. Apparently the infection started in his first pre-molar root and formed a pocket in his dewlap area for the puss to drain into. This pocket was quite large in size. Thankfully Dr. Munn was able to get everything out for us.

He’ll go back to the vet’s Saturday morning for scraping and a deeper flushing then what we can do at home. He came home with 3 days worth of Tramadol to be given twice daily, Baytril twice daily for at least a month and Metacam.

We managed to flush the hole out last night which he didn’t seem to mind too much. We’re hand feeding every 2-3 hours, but he is eating small amounts of leafy greens and shredded carrot on his own as well as the leafy parts of his hay. Timmy is certainly doing better in the eating department then I expected. Right now he basically sleeps, picks at food and wants to be snuggled a lot, which we’re more then happy to do.

All flushing will be done from the outside, but the flushing fluid does drain into his mouth a bit, so we need to do it with his head leaning forward and down a bit so he doesn’t choke.

These are a few photos of his hole. They aren’t the greatest, but being his first night home we didn’t want to annoy him too much.

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I will try to get better ones tonight. Timmy has a very long recovery ahead of him and we’ll have a lot of sleepless nights. We’ll certainly be doing everything possible for him. Nor will be eating much after paying the second hefty vet bill in only a couple weeks. Oh and not that it matters much at this point, but the vet corrected herself, the surgery was 2 ½ hours long, not 2 hours.

User avatar
Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Thu Jan 29, 2009 9:22 am


It does look like a substantial surgery. It looks like you are in good hands with Dr. Munn. If you get any clear closeups that you'd like me to add permanently to the thread, let me know.

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Bytxlaura
Remembering Nemo

Post   » Thu Jan 29, 2009 2:56 pm


I wish Timmy a speedy recovery. Thank you for being there for him!

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Kallie

Post   » Thu Jan 29, 2009 4:53 pm


Here are the xray scans as promised

The first scan is of Timmy's left side which had the abcessed pre-molar root. Just under the bottom jaw bone, you can see a small clear lump. That is where the abcess starts. If you look at the large pale shaded area just behind that, that's where the abcess capsule was, where all the puss was draining in to.

If you're having troubles seeing it, I can draw on the scan and post it again.

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The 2nd scan is of his right side where it shows no abcessed teeth, though the xray isnt overly clear. You can also see the abcess capsule in it.

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Today he's really giving us a hard time with the hand feeding, so I imagine his mouth is very sore today. I'm going to try leaving some Critical Care on a plate for him to see if he'll eat it better that way. The hole also smells quite bad, so I will flush it out in a bit. I was warned it would be smelly over the next week or so as the healing begins.

I will also try to get some close-up photos of the hole.

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