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Post by teemu on Feb 14, 2023 16:53:36 GMT
I don't know what is going on, but I found Posso looking very poor and pained, huddled at the bottom of the cage. She is very low energy and lethargic.
Closer examination turned out that she has lost weight and her sides are very sunken, so likely has been eating poorly for some time. However, she was still full of activity yesterday, ate normally, was seen drinking and played with sticks that I gave them. Her outward condition totally collapsed during the night.
She is now very lethargic and has no energy, crawling around and falling asleep due to the exertion. She can still move if needed but does not resist being picked up (she does not like being handled and normally runs away if anyone gets too handsy). It looks very bad, in my opinion. She does not want to eat.
I'll take her to the vet as soon as possible, but I'm not sure if there's anything to be done. She's really ill. I have made her to take some CC, and I mixed in a small amount of simethicone, in case it is due to stomach distress.
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Post by teemu on Feb 14, 2023 17:47:21 GMT
The CC feels like it's given her a bit more energy. She keep changing positions in the cage. I'll try to feed her more after a bit.
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Post by moletteuk on Feb 14, 2023 20:18:06 GMT
I'm very sorry to hear this. Keep going with the CC until you can get her to the vet, try and get enough into her to see her through the night.
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Post by teemu on Feb 14, 2023 20:42:21 GMT
She's perked up a bit. Very tired and quite limp, but she's gotten a bit more determination in her. I am actually quite worried about her losing too much body heat. She keeps getting very cold, but won't stay on the heat pad, so she lays down in different parts of the cage and goes very cold. I'm trying to keep her under my shirt now, but am not sure how to sort this out for the night...
It doesn't help that Pulla is quite clueless and seems to be fine with her just wandering around.
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Post by teemu on Feb 14, 2023 22:19:51 GMT
She's quite out of it and just lays down when not disturbed. I am not sure if she's in pain or just really lethargic. I'm wondering if it would help to give her some painkiller. I have some left from their dentals...
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Post by bouncy on Feb 14, 2023 22:27:02 GMT
Sounds like Posso needs to see the vet!
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Post by savvy on Feb 14, 2023 22:31:16 GMT
Is there an emergency vet you can contact tonight?
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Post by teemu on Feb 14, 2023 22:32:27 GMT
Sounds like Posso needs to see the vet!
Yes, she has a time right in the morning. I'm a bit pessimistic about the outcome, but we'll see...
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Post by savvy on Feb 14, 2023 22:33:58 GMT
I wouldn't wait until the morning, I think she needs a vet now.
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Post by teemu on Feb 14, 2023 22:34:14 GMT
Is there an emergency vet you can contact tonight?
I could not get there even if there was, and from what I know, there aren't really any who have any real ideas about degus. We'll have to hold out until the morning. She's being really brave, and she hasn't really gotten worse from what I can see, but no improvement either (aside from some energy now and then from the CC).
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Post by bouncy on Feb 15, 2023 2:17:31 GMT
Make sure you keep Posso warm in the meantime:)
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Post by teemu on Feb 15, 2023 11:29:06 GMT
I am currently at the vet. I stayed up most of the night making sure she stayed warm and was hydrated and had some CC in her.
She was a bit more active today and seemed to comprehend more about what was going on around her. I don't know at all how this will go, but we'll see.
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Post by moletteuk on Feb 15, 2023 11:33:10 GMT
Good luck, Teemu.
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Post by teemu on Feb 15, 2023 12:54:37 GMT
I just called them and they said that she had very large tooth spurs in multiple molars that were pressing against tongue and cheek. I really don't know how this is possible, she was checked and even x-rayed just some months ago and had everything fixed then.
I really hope that is everything thag was going wrong. It seems really surprising, since she absolutely just collapsed overnight. But they checked her over for two hours and went through everything and found nothing else.
In any case, her teeth have been fixed and she's been hydrated and can soon come home. I hope that really was everything.
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Post by savvy on Feb 15, 2023 13:01:27 GMT
Its surprising just how quick teeth spurs can grow. Their teeth grow at about 1mm a day.
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Post by moletteuk on Feb 15, 2023 14:06:49 GMT
Hopefully she will make a swift recovery. Did she need antibiotics for any wounds?
I can really recommend weighing everyone weekly for helping to catch things like this. Perhaps you could set up some sort of calendar system for noting dates and setting up reminders for checking things related to each degu, or some version of this that might work for you. So you could figure out the time between this dental and the previous one and then perhaps take one third(?) of that time and note that point in the future to start paying particular attention to Posso?
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Post by teemu on Feb 15, 2023 16:00:05 GMT
Posso is home now, but it feels a bit early to celebrate. She is in a poor condition, and when I picked her up, my impression was that the vet was wary of giving any prognosis yet. They admitted that she is in a really poor condition for just some dental spurs, especially since her condition collapsed practically out of nowhere. The spurs were the diagnosis mostly because they could not find anything else in her at all, despite spending multiple hours looking. They asked me to check back with her condition daily via phone, did mention that if her condition would not improve after some time, going by her current condition, they would recommend euthanasia.
It's too early to tell, but essentially she is very poorly considering what they found. The vet said that if it's not the teeth, it's likely not something that can be treated, such as liver or organ failure. They did not really recommend looking for those, since the tests can be quite traumatic (targeted samples in a small animal) and they would very likely not be treatable. Hopefully she will make a swift recovery. Did she need antibiotics for any wounds? I can really recommend weighing everyone weekly for helping to catch things like this. Perhaps you could set up some sort of calendar system for noting dates and setting up reminders for checking things related to each degu, or some version of this that might work for you. So you could figure out the time between this dental and the previous one and then perhaps take one third(?) of that time and note that point in the future to start paying particular attention to Posso?
No antibiotics. Apparently the spurs were not as large as the impression I got from when I called them, more like just quite notable. They had not yet caused notable damage, fortunately. She was given the usual metacam, and also a stomach medication (metoclopramide) for a couple of days, essentially to help her stomach get along after being emptier than normal. Other than that, it's CC and the usual things.
And yes, I will definitely be making a note to watch her more carefully. I tend to monitor most of my degus, but Posso has always been quite independent and does not really want to be handled (plus she's always super active and has really seemed to be the best-off of all my girls), so she has kind of slipped my monitoring. But since this is the second time in a short while that her teeth are off, I'll definitely be doing regular checks on her now.
I did ask them if there was possibly something wrong with her teeth that could explain why she's having these issues back-to-back, but apparently they did consider that and found nothing odd. Her bite is even (aside from the spurs of course) and the teeth meet each other correctly as far as they could see. I'm really not sure if it's something I could help prevent...
I've been thinking that they get more sunflower seeds than other seeds, so they get more phosphorus than calcium, which could be a reason, but nobody else is having these issues like this, and their food already includes calcium in it. But it couldn't hurt to start trying to balance out their intake of calcium/phosphorus more, I think?
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Post by moletteuk on Feb 15, 2023 21:20:47 GMT
I think it would make sense if there is something else going on, I know you take excellent care of your degus, maybe it could be some kind of infection that could suddenly strip weight from her quickly. Get as much Cc into her as she will take, is all I can suggest.
Sunflower seeds aren't great, but it seems probable that some degus are more tolerant of phosphorus than others.
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Post by teemu on Feb 15, 2023 21:37:27 GMT
She is still totally out of it and can barely move around. She also can't seem to take in more than very little CC at a time, and gets really cold if left to her own for any amount of time. I'm really doubtful that it's just her teeth. They hydrated her at the vet and she's on metacam and all, but shows no real signs of improvement yet.
She's not totally laid out, and she does have bursts of energy where she moves around or tries to escape when I take her out to see to her, but it's really abject right now. I think that basically the only hope right now is that she was in a much worse condition than she seemed to be for some time (which might be, her sides were quite sunken) and that she'll bounce back after some days of intensive care. If that's not the case and she just collapsed this quickly, then I don't think this will end well.
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Post by moletteuk on Feb 15, 2023 22:08:17 GMT
I've got my fingers crossed, sending best wishes.
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