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Bit of advice please

L

lsmcspaul

New Born Pup
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Evening everyone, we're after some of your expert advice please.

Earlier this evening we put some fresh hay in for our piggies, the 3 of them usually come running out all excited when we put fresh hay in but this time they never, 2 came sheepishly out and 1 just stayed in her hidey. We eventually tempted her out but noticed she was limping, she was holding 1 of her front paws up and hopping.

She is eating and sleeping and the others are lying right next to her which they don't normally do, they normally have a hidey each.

We phoned our vets and they said tomoz @1pm is earliest or emergency out of hours @ £95 before 8pm @ £150 after 8pm for consultation fee before treatment/xrays 🤯.

We've just took her to vet now so waiting for outcome but what we wanted to ask is what could it possibly be? She hasn't been dropped and the 3 girls always get on and never fight.
Could she of done it playing/popcorning?

Also, if its sprain or break, do we have to keep her separate from the other piggies to let her heal abit? We've got a c&c cage and can easily put a divide in to keep them separate and they can still see each other.

Thanks in advance.
 
Obviously only the vet can tell you what is actually going on but they can sprain themselves quite easily.
Dont separate her from her friends.
I hope she is ok and makes a quick recovery
 
Piggies&buns said:
Obviously only the vet can tell you what is actually going on but they can sprain themselves quite easily.
Dont separate her from her friends.
I hope she is ok and makes a quick recovery
Click to expand...
Thanks for your reply, we are just worrying as its horrible to see the poor little things in pain.

Was only asking about separating as worried just incase the others hurt her if she's in pain/injured.

We'll keep them all together when she gets home from vets, just hope it's nothing bad 😔.
 
lsmcspaul said:
Evening everyone, we're after some of your expert advice please.

Earlier this evening we put some fresh hay in for our piggies, the 3 of them usually come running out all excited when we put fresh hay in but this time they never, 2 came sheepishly out and 1 just stayed in her hidey. We eventually tempted her out but noticed she was limping, she was holding 1 of her front paws up and hopping.

She is eating and sleeping and the others are lying right next to her which they don't normally do, they normally have a hidey each.

We phoned our vets and they said tomoz @1pm is earliest or emergency out of hours @ £95 before 8pm @ £150 after 8pm for consultation fee before treatment/xrays 🤯.

We've just took her to vet now so waiting for outcome but what we wanted to ask is what could it possibly be? She hasn't been dropped and the 3 girls always get on and never fight.
Could she of done it playing/popcorning?

Also, if its sprain or break, do we have to keep her separate from the other piggies to let her heal abit? We've got a c&c cage and can easily put a divide in to keep them separate and they can still see each other.

Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

Hi

Sprains are pretty common in lively piggies. Can you check whether she is still able to put weight on her foot (pushing back sightly if unwilling when you hold your finger under the paw) or not at all? In the first case, you are likely dealing with a sprain somewhere on the leg limb from the shoulder downward (the problem is not necessarily sitting in the foot as many people assume) and seeing your vet during regular opening hours is perfectly OK ; in the second case, it is a break, which should be ideally seen as soon as you can.

All the best)
 
Wiebke said:
Hi

Sprains are pretty common in lively piggies. Can you check whether she is still able to put weight on her foot (pushing back sightly if unwilling when you hold your finger under the paw) or not at all? In the first case, you are likely dealing with a sprain somewhere on the leg limb from the shoulder downward (the problem is not necessarily sitting in the foot as many people assume) and seeing your vet during regular opening hours is perfectly OK ; in the second case, it is a break, which should be ideally seen as soon as you can.

All the best)
Click to expand...
She isn't squeaking but is really quiet and she definatly doesn't want to put pressure on her leg when walking and just hops, holding her paw up. We haven't examined her as didn't want to hurt her or stress her, we've just picked her up, had a look as best we could and can't see anything stand out and put her into her carry case (were she munched away on hay) and she's at emergency vets at the mo, so we're waiting to find out what's wrong.

Fingers crossed its nothing to serious.

Little girl really worried about her piggie at the mo 😔

Thanks for replies.
 
Good luck! Hopefully it is just a bad sprain/ Because the front legs are weight bearing ones, the hobbling around is generally more pronounced that with a sprained back leg because they are used as springs.
 
Right, abit of a weird update.

Vets seen piggie, said they've examined her and can't see anything wrong, they said she was running around and looked OK when they put her in the piggies run. They said if it was a sprain or break, she'd of been in pain when they examined her but she wasn't and she let them feel and check and she wouldn't of been running round like she was either.

They've gave her a pain injection and said split her from the other pigs for tonight to make sure she eating and pooing ok and if she no better in the morning to take her back tomoz morning, they haven't given us any medacine or pain relief.

They said it could be abit of a dead leg or stress and piggie is focusing on her leg if that makes any sense (I didn't understand it).

But £95 and we still don't know what it is. The vets we used are ment to be good and they have 1 of the uks best guinea pig vets working there Molly Varga so they must know what they are on about.

Will just have to monitor and see how she does. Will keep you all informed.
 
You will just have to see how she goes. Hopefully she is ok!

One of my boys hurt his leg. He was limping around the cage. I took him to the vet. When the vet came out to me after examining him, he said that he was using the leg and walking normally and was not showing any pain response to touch but was pretty sure it was his prey response in action - he was simply hiding his pain as he was in an unfamiliar environment. They prescribed a weeks worth of metacam anyway. Sure enough, when I got him home and put him back in his cage, he immediately went back to limping. He had definitely hurt himself. After a few days of anti inflammatory pain relief, he was much improved and at the end of the weeks course, he was back to normal.
 
Hope she’s ok and it was just a temporary blip.
Piggies do like to worry us, especially such a caring owner as you are.
 
Update, piggie was still limping when she came home last night and still limping abit this morning, she is out and about and munching away but just seems to not want to put full pressure on her leg.

I also got a txt from the vets this morning saying to ring to make a payment?
We paid the £91.20 out of hours fee last night so we was wondering what it was for. When I phoned it was for £15.90 for metacam injection.
I explained our piggie is still not right and even though the vet couldn't see anything wrong with her last night, that we weren't prescribed any course of pain killer/anti inflammatory to be on the safe side, so they said you will have to book another appointment to get piggie checked again @ £57 + another £15.90 if she needs any meds.

I've booked her back in for today to get checked again but wondering with the price mounting up can u get insurance for piggies for in the future?

I'll let u all know how we get on at vets later.
 
I’m sorry to hear she is still struggling. If she wasnt limping in The appointment yesterday but has since you got home then it does sound as if she was hiding it yesterday during her appointment.
Let us know how you get on at her appointment
There is only one insurer for guinea pigs - Exotic Direct. You obviously do just need to be mindful of the fine print and the excess you have to pay. A lot of us set up a separate bank account and save into it monthly purely for a vet fund.
 
@PigglePuggle what are the charges like at the vets you use in Liverpool?
I use Irby Vets in Wirral and although expensive they’re fair charges.
The advice to set up a vet fund as @Piggies&buns suggested is one of the best bits of advice I received on the forum.

Hope you can find a solution for your girl
 
Our vets charge very reasonably but I know they arent taking on new patients at the moment I'm afraid, they will take on new animals from existing clients but no new clients... hence PomPom bunny being registered to us not my daughter!
 
Also just read the rest of this thread- Dr Molly Varga is a truly excellent vet, but its awfully hard to get an appointment specifically with her without her choosing to take the case after a specialist referral from another vet, and she certainly doesnt work out of hours, so you probably saw a junior vet at the practice who may not be as experienced. Though the practice is very good, it is a specialist exotic referral hospital so will cost an absolute fortune- £117 for a regular consultation aside from any meds, diagnostics, or the extra out of hours fee.
We were referred specifically to Molly from our regular vet and it was absolutely worth every penny and I wouldnt hesitate to recommend her for difficult cases.
But if you just need a leg xray and a bottle of metacam... we use Vets4Pets Penny Lane usually, £25 consultation fee! I think they are not currently taking new clients but perhaps if you call them they might advise you which other local vets they recommend- many of their vets rotate around the other local Vets4Pets practices I think too... maybe if you mention that "the guinea pig lady" recommended them they might squeeze you in :)
 
Been to the vets, they let me in to watch while they done a thourgh examination, weight, checked eyes, teeth, listened internal and then full feel of body and tested movement in legs. The vet was really good and loved the piggie, he said he can feel a bit of resistance when he tries to fully move her leg (like she's in pain and doesn't want him to move it) but it does move ok and he couldn't see/feel anything that was outta place. He said were gonna try her on a course of pain killer/anti inflamatories to make sure and booked me another appointment for in 7 days which he said if she's OK by then just cancel but if she's not right to bring her in and they will investigate further.

He asked me about where she lives, whats she like and how does she get on with the other piggies, he said cause shes very playfull with the baby piggie, she might of pulled a muscle, strain, sprain or a bit of nerve damage when zooming/popcorning and to try and not let her go too mad playing and rest till she's better.

We've just gotta see how she is now and thank u all for your replies.
 
PigglePuggle said:
Also just read the rest of this thread- Dr Molly Varga is a truly excellent vet, but its awfully hard to get an appointment specifically with her without her choosing to take the case after a specialist referral from another vet, and she certainly doesnt work out of hours, so you probably saw a junior vet at the practice who may not be as experienced. Though the practice is very good, it is a specialist exotic referral hospital so will cost an absolute fortune- £117 for a regular consultation aside from any meds, diagnostics, or the extra out of hours fee.
We were referred specifically to Molly from our regular vet and it was absolutely worth every penny and I wouldnt hesitate to recommend her for difficult cases.
But if you just need a leg xray and a bottle of metacam... we use Vets4Pets Penny Lane usually, £25 consultation fee! I think they are not currently taking new clients but perhaps if you call them they might advise you which other local vets they recommend- many of their vets rotate around the other local Vets4Pets practices I think too... maybe if you mention that "the guinea pig lady" recommended them they might squeeze you in :)
Click to expand...
The fees for last night were for out of hours so that's why they were quite a bit but our usual vets who is part of the same pet hospital where we went last night are really good and that's were I ended up going this afternoon instead of back to the hospital.

I ended up paying £91.20 for last night and because I went to my own vets today instead of back to the hospital it worked out alot cheaper, I owed £15.90 for the hospital meds last night and including todays appointment and a course of meds they ended up charging me a total of £38 so I was made up with that.
 
Glad you had a good vet experience in the end and it sounds like piggy got a very thorough check up- hope the leg heals well x
 
aww hope she will be ok.. hopefully the course of drugs will ease her if she is in pain. I second the vet fund - insurance is so expensive for piggies.. I keep a little paypal account and anything i sell round the house or make i stash away in there for the pigs/vets! Out of hours fee's are very expensive before you start adding any medicines on... We had to use one once on xmas day to have our piggy PTS - I was distraught at the time and they only actually charged me for the actual injection which i was grateful for..
 
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