Timothy - weight loss

Alibabble

Post   » Sun May 02, 2010 3:13 pm


Cut off the buprenoprhine last night but kept the metacam. He does look a more alert today and maintained his body weight over the past twelve hours. I will be so very, very thankful if this keeps up. My poor vet has been a bit of wreck over this, something about working on a coworkers pet I think. It's odd because she does a lot of routine surgeries on rats and rabbits at the other clinic she works at, they do all of those surgeries for a local rescue.

Talishan
You can quote me

Post   » Sun May 02, 2010 11:23 pm


" ... something about working on a coworkers pet I think."

Probably.

Ditto Lynx. The clinical outline you've given is very interesting and valuable.

Glad to hear he's doing better.

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Mon May 03, 2010 9:41 am


By the way, I added your post with a link to your post here in the Records forum:

https://www.guinealynx.info/records/viewtopic.php?t=153

Alibabble

Post   » Mon Oct 24, 2011 12:50 pm


Timothy and I are in northern town hell. The only vet that will see him is an hour and half away, that's not a big deal right now since we don't have snow yet. It'll be more of a hassle in the winter but I can still pull it off. Only problem is that the vet is not particularly good. He's just the *only* vet that will see Timothy. My next best options are 3 hours away (maybe a vet there) and 8 hours (a vet I used to work for).

Over two weeks he lost 150g putting him at 1kg as opposed to his healthy 1.15kg self. He is still eating just not enough. He's not eager to see his veggies but he will eventually eat them. Same deal for hay and pellets. I just got an order of orchard grass in that he seems a tiny bit more interested in but nowhere near normal. I've been supplementing with CC mixed with a bit of baby food to keep his interest up. He's been eating most of that with minimal syringe feeding from me. I think it's guinea pig crack.

The vet could not get blood from him nor a decent urine sample. The sample Timothy provided in the kennel had no blood, the occasional crystal and a normal USG. His teeth looked wonderful and the vet did actually have the correct equipment to get a good look. His x-ray machine was down and he's still waiting on parts. This is the northern hell part of the equation. The vet didn't seem to think he'd have more luck getting a blood sample at a later date, I think I may be the only person he's met who wanted bloodwork done on her guinea pig.

No palpable masses or guarding, lungs sound great, no eye discharge, no pained noises when eliminating and no murmur heard. Basically, we've got anorexia and the history of the occasional cough. I think I got complacent with typically hearing him cough while eating and I've now caught him coughing at other times. It's rare but it is happening. The good news is that this vet is willing to give me heart meds just in case, mostly because he has no idea what is happening. He'll be calling it in today to the one compounding pharmacy available since they're not open on Sundays nor was the vet. I just somehow managed to catch him in the office catching up on paperwork. I miss my old vet.

Talishan
You can quote me

Post   » Tue Oct 25, 2011 12:53 am


Very lucky you were able to catch him, and very nice of him to give you the heart med. I realize you're in no-access-hell but he does sound like a decent vet.

Having said that -- I still suspect teeth which means x-ray parts needed. Any idea when they will be in?

Without reading back, how old is Timothy?

The heart med alone may do the trick. Please keep us posted.

Alibabble

Post   » Tue Oct 25, 2011 10:50 am


He's six now but, prior to this, still acted like a young pig. Less popcorning and zoomies but they did still happen.

The x-ray parts should be in today, I'm going to call once they open. They don't have dental x-rays nor does any clinic in the surrounding area that is willing to see guinea pigs. I'm disturbed that they just flat our refuse to see them, the idea of having an emergency terrifies me. True, the good ER clinic where I lived before was an hour away but they were GOOD and fully equipped for everything.

I missed the vet's call yesterday but he mentioned he was calling the script into the compounding pharmacy. I missed the pharmacy by about 5 minutes. This morning I'll figure out what we got and negotiate if need be.

Alibabble

Post   » Fri Oct 28, 2011 10:57 am


We got a lateral and v/d of him but couldn't get any skull rads without sedation and the vet is nervous to try it. He's completely discounting any dental problems since, with the buccal separators, he couldn't see any spurs or impaired tongue movement or anything else that looked wrong. Whole pig shots looked good overall but he did have a bit of gas so we've added on simethicone. Well, it's more like I told the vet I was going to and he didn't object.

We started on the enalapril but I'd love some input on dosage. The reference the vet went with was 0.5 mg every other day for a roughly 1kg pig. I'm pretty sure that I did 0.25mg SID for Alfalfa but I can't find it in my records. Any thoughts?

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Fri Oct 28, 2011 5:33 pm


I'd look over the heart page and the heart sticky if no one has any ideas.

Alibabble

Post   » Wed Nov 16, 2011 2:46 pm


Timmy is doing quite well, he's put on most of the weight he lost. He's more active, begging for veggies, and did a great starving pig impression for my Mom on her visit. Behaviourally, he's back to normal.

The past two days I've noticed some calcium grit on his fleece. No pain when peeing, no visible blood in the urine. He's getting unlimited grassy hay, limited Oxbow pellets and veggies in a 2:1 Ca:P ratio. I'm working on lowering that to a 1.5:1 ratio. He's also getting some critical care offered daily because he loves it and I want to up his weight a bit more. The only real change to his diet has been the compounded enalapril.

Does anyone have any information on calcium content in compounded meds? I'm waiting for a callback from my vet and from the pharmacist that does the compounding. We've tentatively scheduled a vet visit for tomorrow. If we get heavy snows I might not be able to make it as I don't have winter tires installed yet and I'm not buying tires until I find out what Timothy will need. Catch-22s are always good fun. In case of snow I'm hoping to convince a local vet to see him, do some rads and a UA and forward to my other vet.

Right now I'm thinking rads to rule out stones and take a look at what we may be looking at in terms of sludge. I'm upping water intake via syringe and will likely be asking for SQ fluid supplies to help flush out his system. He hasn't increased water intake on his own but there wasn't a noticeable difference when he had his stone. My previous vet didn't see the point to adding polycitra but I'm going to talk to this vet and see if he's will to try. Help?

bpatters
And got the T-shirt

Post   » Wed Nov 16, 2011 4:10 pm


Have you seen the thread on here discussing whether Oxbow pellets contribute to gritty urine in some pigs? There's some anecdotal evidence that switching to Kleenmama's has helped some pigs with that problem.

Since you're in Canada, you can't get KM at the moment, but I wonder if a switch to another kind of pellet with a different calcium compound in it might help.

Alibabble

Post   » Tue Apr 17, 2012 5:06 pm


And... we're back. If anyone had wondered apparently most compounded meds, and certainly my enalapril, don't have a calcium content at all. The UA and rads were good. It just seemed to be a transient thing as he's stopped having any grit whatsoever. Or it could have been linked to the pellets, I've gone pelletless with him now. It's more work but I feel more secure about it.

He's lost 20 grams in about a week and had reduced appetite so we were off to the vet again today. I managed to track the one in town down that I had worked with at a previous job. He has next to no experience with guinea pigs but was thrilled to have permission to do more than euthanize or toss random ABs at one.

Teeth looked good, examined with sedation. Rads looked good, no stones and no fluid. Were able to do a mini panel in house and rule out diabetes and kidney disease. Liver values are waaay out of whack though, I'll get the exact values when I speak to the vet this evening since I forgot to record them at the clinic. The vet is thinking primary liver disease of some sort based upon the numbers. We don't have an U/S and I'm not willing to do a liver biopsy on him at this time.

Plan is to correct his mild dehydration and then continue with some SQ fluids with added B12 on a regular basis. His temp was normal and I don't want to toss ABs at him when there's no sign of an infection. I'm going to suggest denamarin or separate SAM-e and milk thistle supplements, I think the vet will be supportive. Anyone have actual dosages? I can't seem to find them anywhere.

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Tue Apr 17, 2012 9:39 pm


I don't believe there are any in the guide.

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