Moon's Medical Topic

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ItsaZoo
Supporter in 2024

Post   » Thu Jan 23, 2025 11:13 pm


When my pigs had Baytril, it was the liquid injectable but given by mouth. As Lynx said, it tastes bitter. My current vet mixes it with butterscotch flavoring. She does this with most liquids so they go down much more easily.

I’m hoping things improve for Moon.

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Lynx
Resist!!!

Post   » Sat Jan 25, 2025 3:09 pm


Unsure if stockpiling Baytril would be wise. Usually a drug is transferred from one container to another - hard to know real shelf life and effectiveness if so.

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AviN4
Supporter in '21

Post   » Sat Jan 25, 2025 5:13 pm


Thanks Lynx, that makes sense. I'll hold onto this Baytril bottle for possible future use if no better options are available at the time, but will be sure keep your concern in mind.

Related, I have some positive news. On Friday (1/24), when Dr D heard about Moon's condition, she wanted to me to bring him in again. So I did. Dr. D was especially concerned about the lethargy, which seemed worse to her than last time. Dr. D observed that Moon's breathing still seemed abnormal to her. She also clarified her previous comments about the x-ray, and said she believed fluid in lungs, perhaps caused by pneumonia, is plausible. She wasn't sure if we had given the Tribrissen (Bactrim) enough time but she agreed that switching to Baytril ("the big guns") would be reasonable. She said she could give an injection of Baytril to get started, so we proceeded with that.

Within a few hours, Moon's condition started to improve. I could tell during his afternoon hand feeding session that he had more energy, and started eating a small amount of lettuce from my hand. Then on his evening hand feeding session, he clearly had more energy, with struggling during the hand feeding and a daring leap off my lap as I was filling syringes. I started the first dose of the oral Baytril this morning, and by his afternoon hand feeding session afternoon he took an even larger leap. He's clearly not 100%, but in terms of energy, he's been doing much better than any time since Tuesday (1/21).

I was surprised that the Baytril injection appeared to be improving symptoms within hours, and wondered if that was even possible. But maybe it can in some animals? From a product description for Baytril for cattle: "In cattle, Baytril 100 reaches therapeutic drug concentrations at the site of infection within the lung in one to two hours." Of course the improvement could be from another cause and the timing could be coincidental. I'll continue to monitor. But so far, it's looking promising!

I've also read the probiotics page and collected some poops from Paulie in case it seems helpful later. (We made the sad decision to surrender Paulie back to the shelter and did so today. The shelter says they only adopt out single guinea pigs as a cagemate for an existing guinea pig, so we hope he'll end up in a new home with a new friend soon.)

At Dr. D, I also asked about heart disease and enlarged heart as a symptom. She said it was possible, but that she does not have the expertise to determine that from an x-ray. (Likely not relevant anyway if the Baytril ends up curing whatever his condition is.)

I've also ordered some Vitamin C drops as recommended by Dr. D. I doubt it's necessary, but it seems unlikely to hurt. I plan to mix it into his Critical Care.

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Lynx
Resist!!!

Post   » Sat Jan 25, 2025 10:13 pm


I hope he continues to improve!

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ItsaZoo
Supporter in 2024

Post   » Sat Jan 25, 2025 11:07 pm


Good news that Moon is responding well. The vets you are seeing seem to be pretty knowledgeable.

From what I’ve read, Baytril starts working in a few hours but it can take up to 24 hours to see results. However, I think that’s if it’s given by mouth.

One thing about vitamin C drops that I just learned is do not mix them with city water. The chlorine in city water neutralizes Vitamin C. So you might want to buy some bottled water to mix the Critical Care and add vitamin C. My vet just told me about that because I was syringing vitamin C drops and probiotics.

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Lynx
Resist!!!

Post   » Sun Jan 26, 2025 6:00 am


That's interesting about the chlorine. I do not recall in all these years a caution about that.

In doing a search using "chlorine" and "vitamin C", I found vitamin C is used to neutralize chlorine in various situations so there must be some sort of chemical reaction (in which case the vitamin C would not be as potent or no longer present). Here's one on neutralizing chlorine in water systems. Move down the page to:
VITAMIN C DECHLORINATION
https://www.fs.usda.gov/t-d/pubs/html/0 ... 31301.html

I do tend to think that if you can't smell it (not strongly present, probably the case by the time it gets to your home), the fact that somewhere along the treatment process chlorine was added to your water does not mean it is present in any significant amounts.

But interesting all the same!

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ItsaZoo
Supporter in 2024

Post   » Sun Jan 26, 2025 3:48 pm


This was news to me as well. Our city uses chloramine because it apparently doesn’t break down like chlorine, but it’s made using chlorine and ammonia. I take a vitamin c supplement myself but it’s a chewable. I seem to remember just aerating water helps remove chlorine, like pouring it from container to container, or leaving it sit for a day before using it to water house plants.

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AviN4
Supporter in '21

Post   » Tue Jan 28, 2025 6:52 pm


Some negative news. The initial Baytril injection was on 1/24, and I've been giving him 4 mg orally every 12 hours since starting on 1/25. Though his condition seemed to improve hours after the first Baytril injection, his energy level and (already minimal) interest in food seems to have started declining again yesterday evening (1/28). I called Dr. B, and he believes we don't have many good options:
  • Dr. B believes that with Moon's age (7+), his prospects for recovery at this point are somewhat poor.
  • Dr. B believes that even the symptoms are being caused by an infection, there may be some other unknown chronic condition.
  • Dr. B said we can try stopping the Baytril, just in case the Baytril is making it worse again. I asked instead about increasing the Baytril dose, and he said that a 50% increase (to 6 mg) would be reasonable to try, but he didn't seem optimistic.
  • I asked about other antibiotics we could try, but Dr. B said wasn't optimistic that additional antibiotics would be worth trying.
  • I asked if we could culture a bacteria sample to determine whether it really is an infection, and if so, what antibiotics would be most effective. Dr. B said that since Moon is not showing obvious symptoms in his eyes, nose, etc, he wouldn't know where to culture from. For pneumonia in a cat or dog, Dr. B says they would get fluid from lungs, but he doesn't believe that this would be practical for a guinea pig.
I forgot to ask specifically about other possible diagnoses (such as heart disease), though Dr. B didn't bring any up, and Dr. D had previously told me they wouldn't know how to diagnose that.

Given the initial positive response to the Baytril, I'm planning to increase the Baytril from 4 mg to 6 mg starting this evening.

Dr. D had previously referred me to several other vet clinics with exotics specialists that may be able to proceed further in terms of diagnoses and treatment. Among the ones Dr. D had recommended, Red Bank Veterinary Hospital is also on the Guinea Lynx vet list, so I'll look into scheduling an appointment. It's a 1 hour drive from us and we don't have a car, but we could rent one.

A few other updates:
  • Moon's weight has still been mostly stable after the initial sharp decline. I assume the Critical Care is helping, but that's probably been only been 15 grams of dry food per day (if even that), probably not enough to maintain his weight. So I think he may be eating more on his own than it seems on the surface.
  • I have started mixing Critical Care with bottled water to reduce possible interaction of chlorine with Vitamin C. (May not be an issue, but I already have some bottles anyway.)
  • I've started adding in some Bene-bac to Moon's Critical Care mix. I gather there are better options for probiotics (dose 2 hours after the antibiotics, use "poop soup" instead), but this is what I've done so far.
ItsaZoo, with regard to your comment that the vets I am seeing seem to be knowledgable: That may be true to some degree, though it's also been especially helpful to know what questions to ask. I really do appreciate the invaluable advice I've received from you all and from the GuineaLynx website.

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Lynx
Resist!!!

Post   » Tue Jan 28, 2025 7:45 pm


I am sorry to hear he has reacted badly to the enrofloxacin (Baytril). I posted this link on the previous page. I do not know of anyone who has taken the course of increasing the antibiotic if there appears to be intolerance. That does not mean your reasoning does not have some merit.
https://www.guinealynx.info/antibiotic_advice.html

If his weight is now stable, you are doing great hand feeding him. I wish I had more/better advice. I routinely let people know I do not have a medical background and can only share what I have learned from pet owners here - some of whom are extremely knowledgeable and have helped many ill guinea pigs.

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AviN4
Supporter in '21

Post   » Tue Jan 28, 2025 8:49 pm


Thank you Lynx. My thinking was that the symptoms are more likely a continuation of his original symptoms from the original cause rather than a bad reaction to the Baytril. Does that make sense? It does make it confusing that 2 of the 3 symptoms of antibiotic intolerance listed by Pinta in in your link (loss of appetite, diarrhea or lethargy) are symptoms Moon had before starting on any antibiotic. Though I would note that he did not and still does not have diarrhea.

Btw, one other comment that Dr. B made is that Moon's white blood cell count was normal, making an infection somewhat less likely. Though he didn't seem convinced either way. I'm also not even sure where this metric is on his blood test. (Perhaps I'm missing a sheet? I can ask tomorrow.)

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Lynx
Resist!!!

Post   » Tue Jan 28, 2025 8:58 pm


I think you mentioned something about heart issues. You have likely read the heart page but I'll put a link here:
https://www.guinealynx.info/heart.html

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ItsaZoo
Supporter in 2024

Post   » Wed Jan 29, 2025 3:31 am


In my experience, Baytril starts to affect appetite in about 3 days. I’ve had 2 pigs with negative reactions to Baytril. They lose their appetite and generally look sick, hunched up with fluffed out fur. I have been lucky to have corn husks on hand, and in both cases they were still interested in eating those along with Critical Care. It took about a week to get them back to normal eating and output,

I hope you can figure out what’s going on with Moon.

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