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Post by bouncy on Dec 27, 2016 12:14:59 GMT
Ditto - fingers crossed! Are they open today, or will you have to wait until Wednesday?
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 27, 2016 12:50:03 GMT
Thankfully, they're open today! Rachel the exotic vet isn't in today, but Veronica the locum vet (who isn't an exotics vet but who did River's neutering correctly and is therefore trusted) has taken them both in - Zoe for examination under general anaesthetic, Nyota so I don't have fights later... She agrees Nyota's leg is probably just sprained, she couldn't feel a fracture and he didn't try biting anyone, so she doesn't want to give painkillers to make sure he stays off it for a few days. If Zoe needs dental X-rays, they'll have to be done at a specialist centre and will cost a fortune, so we're trying exam under anaesthetic first- his eye and cheek are now red and swollen, so we're hoping for an abcess! (And after River, I never thought I'd hear myself say "I'd quite like to be an abcess...") She also said that the reason Nyota isn't eating is because Zoe isn't eating, and as Zoe is boss degu Nyota probably thinks it's not safe to eat, so we're in agreement that we need to do *something* for Zoe. I did laugh when they brought in the plastic cage for them to stay in, and suggested they find a metal one so they didn't come back to find a hole in the plastic cage and two escaped degus
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 27, 2016 13:40:40 GMT
Tooth abscess! Hooray!
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Post by bouncy on Dec 27, 2016 18:23:49 GMT
That's a (relative) relief!
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 27, 2016 18:27:41 GMT
Ok, so everyone is home now. I have been given metacam, baytril and metronidazole - all diluted :/ this was to make drawing up the dose easier, but I think the vet forgot it is easier to sneak 0.04ml into a degu's mouth than 0.4mL I have been given good outcome (Zoe goes back to eating normal food) and come back for review outcome (Zoe does not start eating hard food again) and go to the small critters vet asap outcome (Zoe stops eating soft food). My degu burrito skills are not up to giving two lots of 0.4mL... add in that she's needled in along his jaw, so it's painful to him for me to hold him under the chin (to stop his paws escaping the burrito) and I'm going to have to get up earlier every morning for forever to make sure I have time to burrito him and syringe him. On the upside- she read the note about my degus being chewers and gave me extra syringes
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Post by deguconvert on Dec 27, 2016 21:36:08 GMT
OK . . . I'm really trying to be thrilled that it is an abscess, Does this mean he needs to have the tooth removed, or will the meds do all that needs doing?
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 28, 2016 8:01:21 GMT
OK . . . I'm really trying to be thrilled that it is an abscess, Does this mean he needs to have the tooth removed, or will the meds do all that needs doing? He had the abscess drained by the vet yesterday. Hopefully the draining and antibiotics do the trick; if they don't he may need the tooth pulling. She did keep a sample of abscess goo that can be sent for testing if needed to check which antibiotic would work if metronidazole and baytril don't work.
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Post by moletteuk on Dec 28, 2016 11:50:07 GMT
I think it's important to get the antibiotics into him - if you think he would take it better undiluted or that if it was undiluted you could hide it in food, then just ring the vet and get some undiluted, they won't mind if you explain and it should only be a fiver or so. What is the metronidazole?
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 28, 2016 12:13:14 GMT
I think it's important to get the antibiotics into him - if you think he would take it better undiluted or that if it was undiluted you could hide it in food, then just ring the vet and get some undiluted, they won't mind if you explain and it should only be a fiver or so. What is the metronidazole? I've already rung and asked metronidazole is a liquid antibiotic that covers anaerobes (gut bacteria are mostly non-oxygen-using, which means most antibiotics fail to work effectively). It's the human liquid, but where humans would get 10ml (400mg) he's getting ~0.04mL - but diluted :/ Anyway, the vet said she would redispense them for me, so that's good.
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 28, 2016 21:08:40 GMT
I think I *heart* Veronica - I explained the difficulty in giving the best part of 1ml of abx BD and she gave me undiluted antibiotic, and didn't make me pay extra
Edit: Although, I am going to try to get into the specialist tomorrow if I can. His cheek swelling isn't going down, the drain hole for the abscess has closed and while he is still eating soft food I'd like to have it dealt with before he stops eating altogether.
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Post by deguconvert on Dec 29, 2016 1:53:56 GMT
I totally would be doing the same thing! I hope it all goes exceedingly well!
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 29, 2016 18:36:03 GMT
So on the upside, it turns out Zoe just isn't a morning degu, and that's why he always looks so haggard in the morning On the neutral side, I'm glad I took him and Nyota to the specialist vets tonight, because his eye is very sore as well now- the vet says the conjunctival sac has swollen. She's going to put him under anaesthetic tomorrow, do some dental X-rays and then open the abscess, suture it open and put antibiotic-impregnated gauze in there for a few days. We will then go back next Wednesday to have the gauze removed and the wound cleaned out and sutured closed with a drain in place. On the downside for me, this is going to cost at least £300 and maybe more by the time we're finished. My friend is going to help me out (he's driving us to and from the specialist, but he's also offering financial help) because unfortunately for me, my degu-savings have been wiped by the last few days and I can only hope all this works. I don't want to have to draw the line and say "no, stop here" because of money rather than because it's actually realistically no good prolonging this. I'm having to do a lot of thinking about "at what point will I say 'no more'?"
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Post by deguconvert on Dec 30, 2016 0:50:25 GMT
That's a lot to take in, and on. I'm sorry things are not looking very good!! Sending you hugs!
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 30, 2016 13:47:53 GMT
Ok, so it's not a dental abscess- the X-rays didn't show any tooth involvement. So yay for that, but we can't work out where it started- they haven't been fighting at all lately.
I'm gonna go pick them up at 4ish.
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Post by moletteuk on Dec 30, 2016 15:33:13 GMT
Logic suggests that some specific thing or event has started such a big infection. See if you can have a good chat with the vet when you pick him up, quizz them on what they looked at xrays etc.
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 30, 2016 17:38:30 GMT
No quizzing today, Molly the vet handed over to a colleague before she dashed off to a conference, she left a message saying I could ask as many questions as I wanted at the follow up appointment on Thursday. Old grumpybutt has a hole in his face with a bean in, and two "wires" sticking out. He seems livelier than he was, while still managing to convey that he is most displeased with everything Grumpybutt's beanface by TitchyCatnipSandwich, on Flickr I'm £307 lighter, but I have clear instructions for his meds: Reduce the Baytril to 0.1mL once daily- she said the BD dose would be bacteriostatic rather than bacteriocidal (which flies in the face of what I know of bacterial infections, but I'm willing to go with the expert and just ask lots of questions next week as to where everyone else in the UK and abroad gets BD from if it's an OD dose) Increase the metronidazole to 0.08mL BD (makes sense, kinda - in humans it's TDS) Increase the dog metacam to 0.1mL BD (higher than I've had previously but that's ok) I've also been advised to buy manuka honey for the inevitable moment where he or Nyota remove the antibiotic impregnated "bean", and I am to just fill the wound with honey twice a day at that point. That's gonna be an interesting one...
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Post by deguconvert on Dec 30, 2016 20:16:59 GMT
No kidding!!! That's going to be a bit of an event twice a day, I think. Don't use the solid honey!!
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Post by moletteuk on Dec 30, 2016 20:35:03 GMT
Poor lad...I'm glad to hear he is grumpy though, I think grumpy is better than feeling sorry for himself. I'm only suggesting this very reluctantly, but have you thought about isolating him for a couple of days? I can't see the wire and bean thing lasting 5 minutes otherwise.
Baytril is normally thought to work best twice daily. I would go steady with the metacam, or maybe give him the full dose for a couple of days and then think about reducing it, or see how seems, it's up to you.
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Post by titchycatnipsandwich on Dec 30, 2016 22:43:14 GMT
I haven't the ability to partition off the big cages at the moment, it was something I was thinking about in case I ever need to do introductions again, but never got round to it as everything seems ok on that front. He's drinking of his own volition (hooray!!!) and has eaten half a hazelnut I cracked for him (still can't get into the shells yet). Nyota is currently wildly uninterested in the wire bean part of him, being more concerned with sniffing his butt. Bad degu owner forgot to take the sand bath out, so he's probably now got sand in the bean as well. He's mostly leaving it alone, so I'll let him be for now. (I have removed the sand bath now) My current plan on the antibiotic front is to give as directed and see if I can talk to someone at the surgery tomorrow - Zoe's vet isn't in (conference) but the other exotics vet is and the vet tech we spoke to today said his name with the reverence and pride of talking about someone who knows what they're doing. At any rate, as long as the antibiotic bean is in place I think daily baytril should be ok, the metronidazole will cover anything weird (it does in humans, anyway). As to the metacam, I'm thinking tailor it to him and how he is - if it keeps his jaw pain-free enough for him to eat, I'm happy with BD. He's certainly drinking enough! I should probably go and remove the walnut Zoe has discovered. He can't eat it, but he's cradling it like a baby and yelling at Nyota to go away. Although I'm tempted to leave it and see if he works out how to get in without using his teeth
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Post by deguconvert on Dec 31, 2016 4:01:41 GMT
Leave the walnut, sounds like good entertainment for them. LOL!
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