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blood in the cage - maybe ches?

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biscandmatt

biscandmatt

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i found blood in the cage whilst changing the bedding. there is quite alot aswell. it does seem to be in the areas where there is wee.

i got ches and maisie out and had them on my knee one at a time and fed them cucumber to make them wee. maisie wee'd clear but ches didn't wee at all. he never does on my knee though. he is weeing though as i put them in the cage and checked later on and there was wee's from both of them (i know who's wee is who's!)

the strange thing is that neither of them seem ill or anything. there have been no sounds as though they are in pain and they are both eating as normal.

i have checked them over and i can't find anything. neither has any blood staining around their genital area either. :{

they haven't eaten anything that could stain their urine and it's not from the newspaper either. the only thing that has been different is they have had brown paper bags to play with.

any ideas?
 
Keep an eye out; sometimes it can take some time until you see more signs of a UTI and can identify the culprit. If necessary, sit them singly on some wads of kitchen paper - but I've had piggies hold out for very long stretches of time! Not every pee with UTI is actually bloody - and not every red pee contains blood (as proven by Llewelyn...)

Best of luck!
 
Wiebke said:
Keep an eye out; sometimes it can take some time until you see more signs of a UTI and can identify the culprit. If necessary, sit them singly on some wads of kitchen paper - but I've had piggies hold out for very long stretches of time! Not every pee with UTI is actually bloody - and not every red pee contains blood (as proven by Llewelyn...)

Best of luck!
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would you give it a bit more time before rushing to the vets then? our usual vet isn't in until monday but there is another good vets open tomorrow not far from us. we thought maybe go to our usual vets monday morning and then they can stay in if they need to, for tests etc. i don't know about this kind of thing though.

the amount of blood has worried me though.

i'll try them again on some kitchen roll and see what happens.

if it isn't blood, what could it be?
 
just to add - ches had an xray of his whole body in august 2011 and there was nothing showing up. would stones be a possiblity now in that space of time, or do you think it is looking like it may be a uti?
 
Was it pure blood, or urine mixed with blood?

Terfel had little spots of pure blood at the beginning of his UTI and Telyn started with quite bloody, frequent urine, so she wasn't difficult to spot.

It is always so much frustrating with a weekend coming up and you not sure which piggy yet, isn't it?
 
PS: Stones are always a possibility, but URI is considerably more frequent a complaint.
 
there was some bright red blood and alot of pink colour which i assumed was urine mixed with blood? the pink and red areas are definitely where there is a patch of wee.

i had them both sat on the settee on a towel and their own pieces of kitchen roll. it took 25mins for maisie to wee and her wee was clear again and there was no squeeking or anything worrying.

ches stayed on the settee another 25mins and didn't wee. neither of them pooped either. ches never wee's on my knee or even in the carrier. he doesn't wee that much really. he doesn't drink alot.

i did notice one thing with ches - twice his body tensed up and his tummy rumbled and it sounded like he trumped. other than that they were both fine.

i put them back in their cage and he was begging for a reward! then he lay in his little bed and then wondered arounfd the cage as normal, eating hay.

i'm really confused. :{ i don't know whether to go to the vets that is open tomorrow, or wait to see my usual vet on monday. :... i prefer my vet but if something happened over the weekend i would end up at the emergency vets who are awful. :...

i don't even know for sure it is ches, but i'm 99% sure it is.
 
vets

If it was my piggies I would take to a vet open on a saturday for advice just incase, you could look up a few vets and and call around. I guess there are a number of vets open on a saturday morning.
I have never had this problem before. I would be worried. Remember they are prey and avoid showing if they are ill. Maybe they could identify which one is poorly, take temp, ? blood, urine tests etc. Not an easy one. I would then consider going to my normal vet on the monday if I was not completely happy. Good Luck.
 
thanks. i know which vets it is that is open tomorrow. luckily it's my second choice of vets.

i usually weigh the pigs on a sunday but i thought i would weigh ches tonight instead and he has lost 95g this week 8... i'm gutted and very worried now. i can't believe how fine he seems in himself. without the scales and that blood i would have no clue.

i'm going to be up all night now because i'm really upset. we're ringing the vets as soon as they open and taking him in.

he's at his lowest weight ever. even lower than when he was ill before his dental in august. i'm so upset. 8...
 
Does your piggies butt have blood on it? (odd question i know) I had a piggy who had blood on her poo and butt. She went to the vet and she had a enlarged uterus. She was spayed and is fine.

Best luck to your piggy.
 
IHorseCarzzy5 said:
Does your piggies butt have blood on it? (odd question i know) I had a piggy who had blood on her poo and butt. She went to the vet and she had a enlarged uterus. She was spayed and is fine.

Best luck to your piggy.
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there is no blood on his bum or with his poops. roll on the next few hours, i can't wait to get to the vets.

i'm worrying so much yet ches seems ok generally. :{
 
ches ran over for his breakfast, teeth chattered at me to hurry up making it! he ate it fine and is eating hay fine. there are alot of poops in the cage, both his and maisie's so he is pooping ok it would seem. the poops are fine aswell, the right size and shape and not soft or anything like that, no blood on them.

i'm going to re-weigh him now, hoping i somehow read the scales wrong last night. wishful thinking maybe.

right, off for cuddles now with them and then off to the vets. please think of ches for me, he means the world to me. x
 
I hope your pigs are OK. My Peter Gurney book says that sometimes guinea pig wee has red in it (I can't remember the reason why) which can be mistaken for blood but actually is normal and harmless. It happened to one of my pigs once so we monitored it and it didn't happen again, it was worrying though. Gurney's books are really good and in-depth. Always best to go to the vets, to put your mind at rest .
 
correction

ah sorry, it's not in the Gurney book, it's in 'guinea piglopaedia' by Elward and Ruelokke, here's what it says:

Red Urine:
the urine is stained red due to a red pigment called porphyrin. From time to time, guinea pig urine contains a red pigment called porphyrin. Sometimes, it is associated with eating food rich in Vitamin A, e.g. dandelions. Sometimes there is no obvious cause. It is not associated with disease. Urinalsis shows no red blood cells in urine and the pig has normal urination.
 
we're back - the vet said ches looks ok in himself but obviously he has lost alot of weight. the worrying thing was that i took one towel with blood on and she said it was alot of blood. and that was one of four blood soaked towels/fleeces. :(

she wants to treat him for a uti first for a week and wanted to give me baytril but i asked for septrin instead. so he's on that now, and metacam but i think the doses are way too low personally.

septrin - 0.1ml twice a day
metacam - 0.3ml twice a day

i'm ringing my normal vets on monday to speak to them about the doses and treatment because i also think a weeks course isn't long enough.

she kept saying that with that amount of blood it is more likely to be stones or a tumour or something. but obviously he would need more tests.

after i have spoken to my usual vet i will see what is best but i feel he will probably end up having urine sample and xrays etc.

can anyone advise me on the doses please?

she also mentioned that ches looked quite pale, which i had noticed but didn't mention before. his lips are pink-white rather than pink. he lost quite alot of blood so she thinks he will be feeling quite lethargic and may be anaemic.

i also have to get more fluids into him aswell.

she was a nice vet and i liked that she was honest and said she would recommend going to my usual vets for any further tests etc as they are the best. so at least she was honest about that.

does anyone have any thoughts about all this and the doses, any advice?
 
the vet just rang to change the dose from 0.1ml septrin twice a day to 0.3ml twice a day. she calculated it wrong.
 
Ah poorly pig :( Wishing Ches a speedy recovery. At least he has kind and responsible owners so the odds are in his favour. Also I see you live in Manchester - my vet friend says the best vet for guinea pigs is in Chorlton - Ashleigh vets, I don't know if that's near you or if you go there.
 
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Also my vet friend says the best vets for pigs in Manchester is Ashleigh vets in Chorlton if that's any use to you (unlike my local vet who told us he only treats them for mites and colds!)
 
good luck

Pleased you went to the vets, and your getting the meds sorted. My piggies do fluctuate in weight and I was worried with one of mine and weighed her, she was quite a bit less 80-90g I freaked out and found one of my other pigs fluctuate a bit never over 100g.
I wish your piggie well. x
 
bessiehen said:
Ah poorly pig :( Wishing Ches a speedy recovery. At least he has kind and responsible owners so the odds are in his favour. Also I see you live in Manchester - my vet friend says the best vet for guinea pigs is in Chorlton - Ashleigh vets, I don't know if that's near you or if you go there.
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I have heard that Ashleigh vets are good although I don't take my pigs there.

However, my vets have contact with Ashleigh in case they need some advise. They have done this for me before now.

I would however not hesitate to take my pigs to Ashleigh if needed :)
 
ashleigh vets is our normal vets. we see aidan and he is an amazing exotics vet. the best. unfortunately he was off last week and isn't back until monday but i felt ches couldn't wait that long. but we have decided to take ches first thing monday morning to see aidan and then see where we go from there.

i'm really quite annoyed at the moment because ches was eating fine before we went to this other vets today but since we got back he is struggling to chew and eat. he wants to but is looking like he did before he needed the dental last time. i don't know if she has hurt his mouth when she checked his teeth, or if this was going to happen anyway.

ches is still eating but small pieces of hay and pellet mash. his veg i am having to cut into tiny pieces aswell.

now i'm wondering if the bleeding may have come from his mouth? i really don't know. but he certainly is acting exactly the same as before he needed a dental last time and last time he needed his teeth filed and he also had infections in gaps between the teeth and he has elongated tooth roots aswell so we were told this may happen again. the signs are all the same, minus this blood.

i am now concerned that he is being treated for a uti when that may not be the issue. but i'm going to continue with the septrin and metacam until we see aidan on monday. i'm so glad he's back monday.

ches looks in pain when he eats bt other than that he is acting fairly bright. but when eating earlier, he ate some hay, stopped, looked shocked and then kind of swayed side to side. he was definitely in pain. then he was eating pellet mash but when he got a harder piece of pellet he looked almost scared to try and eat again. luckily he does keep trying and eating small tiny tiny pieces.

i'm giving him his meds in about half an hour, cleaning the cage out to check for anymore blood. and he will be syringe fed now aswell.

he looks very slim now. he's at his lowest weight ever. after his dental and infection he took over a month to build back up but never got near his before weight. now he has dropped even more and it's very worrying.

i will be weighing him daily aswell to keep a record of his weight.

anymore advice welcome. and if anyone could advise what they think of the dose of septrin 0.3ml twice a day. i feel it's very low but i don't have any experience with using septrin.

thanks everyone. x
 
i somehow managed to post this thread twice. can people reply on this one please and ignore the other. thanks. x
 
In all honesty I have only read your last post so if you have answered these questions earlier I apologise. Did the vet do a urine dip stick test to check for infection or blood?

I advised on your other thread Patrick's dose was 0.7ml's twice a day I'm sure, that was the child septrin (banana flavoured).
 
flintstones said:
In all honesty I have only read your last post so if you have answered these questions earlier I apologise. Did the vet do a urine dip stick test to check for infection or blood?

I advised on your other thread Patrick's dose was 0.7ml's twice a day I'm sure, that was the child septrin (banana flavoured).
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sorry, my posts are always so long as i like to get all the info in there. :red

the vet didn't do a urine dip stick test. she just went off the towels covered in blood and the fact he had lost weight. she did say that any tests she would recommend that i do go to my usual vets as they are the best.

we are going monday to our normal vets, first thing so that if they want to do tests then they will have time.

re: the septrin. the bottle said adult but that was crossed out so it is the child one and she said 0.3ml twice a day.

do you think it would do him any harm having it if it isn't a uti?

with the way he is now with his eating i am thinking dental again and that there is a possibility that the blood may have come from his mouth, even though there was no signs of blood there, or anywhere on him at all. although the blood was in patches of wee.

i changed their bedding earlier and there was a tiny amount of very diluted pink colour and that was all.

ches had his septrin and metacam no problems and i didn't syringe him water for the reasons you mentioned earlier, although ches has been drinking water and it is slightly more than he normally would have.

he is struggling with eating. exactly the same as before his dental back in august.

x
 
right, for once i'll try and keep this update short!

- weight last week - 1100g - weight yesterday/day before 1005g to 1023g today (+18g)
- couldn't eat cabbage
- eating slower
- choosing short, thin strands of hay and the pieces of hay i have cut into small pieces
- drinking slightly more water than he normally would
- looks bright and not in any discomfort
- tiny amount of watery pink blood/urine last night
- no blood in the cage today so far
- lips and nose still look a little bit too pale
- fully checked over again with no signs of anything obvious
 
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It looks still like it could be UTI to me! However, I find that septrin dose too low for his weight - the average dose for that is 0.5 ml twice daily, in persistent cases up to 0.7 ml (that was from Simon Maddock for both Terfel and Caron before Christmas); guinea pigs have a much higher metabolic rate and need higher doses than many inexperienced general vets assume when they scale down from cats. Please also ask for metacam (anti-inflammatory and painkiller) for the first days to make your boy mor ecomfy in himself. If you feel strongly that there is the chance of a stone, you will need to ask for an x-ray.

But I would certainly have his teeth checked and have him given a MOT to see whether he has more than one issue - espiecally in view of his weight loss, even though it has stablised for the time being. It can easily be that a weakened body/immune system has let another illness come to the fore.

Best of luck for tomorrow!
 
Good luck at the vets tomorrow. I agree with Wiebke regarding the Seprin dose being too low.

When my Eliza had blood in her urine, she had an Xray to rule out stones. She was on a high dosage of Septrin. I think it was 0.7ml twice a day. I was worried about the dosage at first and had to check with my vet who assured me it was fine.

She was on Septrin for almost five weeks with weekly urine tests at the vets. About halfway through the treatment, her pees looked normal but the dips proved there was still blood present.

Eliza lost weight too.
 
Wiebke said:
It looks still like it could be UTI to me! However, I find that septrin dose too low for his weight - the average dose for that is 0.5 ml twice daily, in persistent cases up to 0.7 ml (that was from Simon Maddock for both Terfel and Caron before Christmas); guinea pigs have a much higher metabolic rate and need higher doses than many inexperienced general vets assume when they scale down from cats. Please also ask for metacam (anti-inflammatory and painkiller) for the first days to make your boy mor ecomfy in himself. If you feel strongly that there is the chance of a stone, you will need to ask for an x-ray.

But I would certainly have his teeth checked and have him given a MOT to see whether he has more than one issue - espiecally in view of his weight loss, even though it has stablised for the time being. It can easily be that a weakened body/immune system has let another illness come to the fore.

Best of luck for tomorrow!
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that't the only trouble when my vet isn't in, i know that the other vets don't really know how to treat as an exotics vet would. but if i end up having to use another vet then when my vet is back in, i go in there and we change things around!

i know my usual vet uses proper doses and the right length courses aswell.

ches is on metacam aswell. i had to mention that as i knew she wouldn't. so at least he is being kept comfortable. he doesn't seem in an discomfort. he's actually surprisingly bright considering. which is good but soooo scary how well they can hide illness :...

thank you so much for all your help and advice. i will go through everything with the vet tomorrow and see what he wants to do.

x
 
Claire W said:
Good luck at the vets tomorrow. I agree with Wiebke regarding the Seprin dose being too low.

When my Eliza had blood in her urine, she had an Xray to rule out stones. She was on a high dosage of Septrin. I think it was 0.7ml twice a day. I was worried about the dosage at first and had to check with my vet who assured me it was fine.

She was on Septrin for almost five weeks with weekly urine tests at the vets. About halfway through the treatment, her pees looked normal but the dips proved there was still blood present.

Eliza lost weight too.
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i think my vet will do all the relevant tests and xrays. he did when my rabbit bisc had signs of a uti. i think we will be at the vets alot these coming weeks then.

thanks for the advice x
 
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