Reba: Satin w/arthritis, bone loss, & teeth issues

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mammabear66
With a Touch of Insanity

Post   » Mon Sep 26, 2005 5:23 pm


Hey, you don't have to yell! :)
I wasn't planning on trying use the laser myself without a PT showing me how. I just wanted to know what to look for so that if I found a good deal on one I could grab it and be ready.

pinta

Post   » Mon Sep 26, 2005 5:34 pm


note "caps lock". I type looking at the keyboard and it gets hit by accident and I don't feel like retyping.

Do a search - I've posted the details a couple of times, I think.

mammabear66
With a Touch of Insanity

Post   » Mon Sep 26, 2005 5:41 pm


Yeah, I saw the caps lock - just messing with you. I do the same thing sometimes.

I did a brief search last nite cuz I know I have seen it posted somewhere. So far haven't found it, so I will have to try later. I was hoping somebody would remember without looking and save me the time of the search. I am drowning in school stuff right now - mine, my husband's, and 2 of my 3 kids!

I am thinking I may need to take her in to check her molars. I am gonna watch her thru today and then decide, but she tosses her veggies and I can't figure out if she is just weird or having problems eating.

mammabear66
With a Touch of Insanity

Post   » Thu Sep 29, 2005 3:55 am


Update;

Reba weighed in on Tuesday morning at only about 5 grams less than Monday nite. Tuesday nite she was the same. I hadn't given her any CC yet during the day because I wanted to see what she did on her own. I fed her about 10-15cc before I went to bed Tuesday nite. Wednesday morning she was UP almost 10 rams from the nite before! Wednesday nite she was the same weight, without any CC again.

YAY!

I also saw her WALK across the cage this morning, without ANY hopping! She has been coming out of her hidey spots and going TO the pellets and hay, instead of me taking them to her. I have observed several more short walks and even running throughout the day, as well as several instances that Radar got sprayed in the face! He evidently is aware that she feels better and has been doing his sexy walk all day. He is doing so as I type!

Actually he is being a little TOO sexy right now. I think I might need to go in and rescue poor Reba for a bit. It is time to medicate 3 out of the 5 piggies anyways. I found liquid GLucosamine/Chondroitin and am giving her that along with the Metacam, vitamin C, and the occassional dribble of liquid B12.

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Thu Sep 29, 2005 9:20 am


Good news. Was she at all incontinent during her ill time?

mammabear66
With a Touch of Insanity

Post   » Thu Sep 29, 2005 3:26 pm


There wasn't any incontinence that I noticed. She tended to pee where she was sleeping and get herself wet, but if we were holding her she would get squirmy and chatter at us when she had to pee, just like she always has.

Her weight was the same as it was last night - actually a couple grams higher. She had no CC at all yesterday, so she seems to be holding her own now. I stopped the CC long enough to see if she could eat enough on her own to maintain. I may still supplement some CC to try to bring her weight back up to normal tho. She lost almost 200 grams total.

Radar is still trying to be a sexy piggy stud. The girls look like they are ready to duct tape him to the roof.

mammabear66
With a Touch of Insanity

Post   » Mon Apr 03, 2006 6:03 pm


This is going to be long, but it is a LOT of info so PLEASE read! . I have been procrastinating posting this all weekend because it just makes it more, well ... real. And I don’t need any more reality. I just got Radar to the point that he has gone 1 month with no sign of abscess or infection and I thought I might be in the clear for a while. I had been dealing with Radar continually since last June (on and off since February 2005)and really thought I was going to lose him. Now I can breathe easier with him but am faced with this.

At the end of February Reba came down with a URI. It cleared up quickly with meds, but then I noticed possible teeth issues. She was having difficulty eating and her weight began dropping. The vet trimmed/filed her molars on 3/14 and all looked fairly good at that point. She wouldn’t eat pellets but has never really done so anyways. She tried to eat veggies, which was a slow process but she managed to get some down. The same with hay. I was told it may take a couple weeks for her to be able to eat on her own.

Things went OK for the first week or so, and then I noticed she was trying less and less to eat on her own. Over the next several days she got to the point that she stopped trying her veggies and hay at all and only wanted the syringe. She will eagerly eat 30 to 50 grams (minus what hits the towel) of CC/mash at each meal, along with several syringes of water.

I can get 4 or 5 meals into her each day. It is slow – it takes 1 to 2 hours each meal – but she is very willing to eat it. I try not to add up the total hours a day that I am spending with a syringe of CC in my hand, but even that does not seem to be enough. It has to be fairly runny for her to be able to eat it. I need to figure out how to add calories to the amount I am giving her. She was down to 650 grams on Saturday. I basically spent the weekend doing almost nothing but feeding her and feeding her and feeding her. I didn’t even spend any quality time with my daughter for her birthday Saturday. I sang Happy Birthday and watched her blow out candles whole feeding a pig. This morning her weight was 670 grams! YAY! This was also after going 11 hours without a feeding due to the migraine that hit me last nite. The fact that she maintained this much is fantastic to me!

Friday we went back to the vet. I asked for x-rays to look for elongated roots or anything that may have been missed. The vet said it was hard to tell but the roots looked like they curled at the end and were possibly overgrown. She also took some body shots. She said her spine is full of arthritis. She showed me where you could see individual vertebrae up by her shoulders but then it all kinda turns to looking like mush. She also remarked that her bones looked funny – thin and mottled. We discussed the possible calcium issues and dug up her x-ray from September. The vet thought that there was a pretty severe difference for only 6 months. What makes it worse is that Reba has already been getting calcium supplements since September!

The vet didn’t have a way of scanning the x-rays so she sent them home with me to post on here. She is open to any input. She doubled Reba’s Metacam to .1cc per day. I just saw the Cartrophen post from September. We had decided it wasn’t needed yet before, but I am going to bring it up again. I forgot about it. The vet also has no clue as to how much calcium we can increase to. She realizes there are kidney stone issues with high doses but at this point that is a minor issue here. She asked me to find out what the highest dose of calcium is that has been used here.

Reba has tried to eat lettuce again over the last couple days. She stands on it and tries to rip it with her teeth. She will also try apples and oranges with some success. Everything takes forever for her to eat tho. She also tried out my hamburger bun last nite while I was feeding her and I both. She got so excited at actually successfully getting a bite of it that I let her go ahead and eat some. I know it isn’t good for her but at this point I am grasping at straws and figure that maybe it will encourage her to try other foods without fear of failure.

I am going to go ahead and get this posted even tho x-rays are not ready to post. I will try to add them in a bit, after I feed Reba again!

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Mon Apr 03, 2006 8:04 pm


Is Reba a satin? Is there any thickening of the jaw? Man, it sounds like you are having a difficult time trying to get food into her. I know Pinta will have some suggestions for you.

If you have copies of both xrays, that would be great. I think you can photograph them. aqh88 on an adjacent thread just put up some xrays.

mammabear66
With a Touch of Insanity

Post   » Mon Apr 03, 2006 9:29 pm


Yes, Reba is a satin. She was one of critterluv's rescues that came from a nasty background. Brianna has her sister, who has just started hopping when she runs, which is how all of this started with Reba last September.

I would think that the jaw is not thickening due to the fact that her other bones are thinning, but I cannot say that for sure.

She does not fight me handfeeding her, she is just incredibly SLOW and very picky with what she wants. For example, ifhe wants water she will refuse the mash until I figure it out and offer water.

Paravati told me how to take pics of the x-rays. I am working on uploading them now and will post them shortly.

mammabear66
With a Touch of Insanity

Post   » Mon Apr 03, 2006 10:01 pm


OK, here are X-rays

Sept. 24, 2005
Image


Larger version

March 31, 2006
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Larger version

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Larger version

Full sized pics are behind the links. Any input is much appreciated.

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salana
GL is Just Peachy

Post   » Mon Apr 03, 2006 11:28 pm


Yow. It looks like her ribs are dissolving away too.

mammabear66
With a Touch of Insanity

Post   » Tue Apr 04, 2006 12:01 am


Yeah, salana, the vet thought all of her bones were thinning and looking mottled. Any ideas on supplements and such? Even the vet agreed that she seems to be a happy spunky little gal still and is not ready to give up on life, but we are going to lose her if something doesn't change fast.

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