• Discussions taking place within this forum are intended for the purpose of assisting you in discussing options with your vet. Any other use of advice given here is done so at your risk, is solely your responsibility and not that of this forum or its owner. Before posting it is your responsibility you abide by this Statement

Cloudy eye

Status
Not open for further replies.
Piggylet

Piggylet

Junior Guinea Pig
Joined
Oct 16, 2011
Messages
100
Reaction score
33
Points
210
My lovely pig Emily has a cloudy white/light bluish eye that I just discovered, there's also a lot of discharge coming from it. She seems her normal self and is squeaking as normal and eating and drinking as normal.

I have phoned the vet to try and get an appointment this evening, but they didn't have any, but I do have one early tomorrow. Is there anything I can do tonight. I was thinking of giving them a clean, but didn't want to aggravate a lot of dust to potentially make it any worse.

It looks horrible. :(
 
I would phone and ask if they have an emergency appointment because eyes are very tricky, it could be a hay poke which may have just scratched the surface causing an irritation but if the hay is still in there or it has gone deeper then it will cost you a lot more money in the long run, think of how you would feel having something stuck in your eye for a minimum of 12 hours.:(
I hope Emily gets better soon.
 
lynda1 said:
I would phone and ask if they have an emergency appointment because eyes are very tricky, it could be a hay poke which may have just scratched the surface causing an irritation but if the hay is still in there or it has gone deeper then it will cost you a lot more money in the long run, think of how you would feel having something stuck in your eye for a minimum of 12 hours.:(
I hope Emily gets better soon.
Click to expand...

I did ask for an emergency appointment but they said they couldn't fit her in.
 
I hope that someone like suzy or helen or one of the many other wonderful people on here come along soon to give you some help, if not could you possibly phone the vet and get some advice over the phone about what you can do to make her more comfortable until your appointment?

Sorry if I sounded a bit off in the last post, I have just spent the last hour trying to talk someone into taking their pet to a vet :red
 
Please try to get her seen by a vet as soon as you can get an appointment. It sounds very much like an ulcerating infection from a poke or an injury to the cornea. Thankfully, with the right treatment, eye infections will go down nearly as quickly as they come on.

If you wish, you can carefully wash the eye with saline solution (1 teaspoon of salt dissolved in 1 pint of boiled cooled water).

here is more about eye injuries: http://www.guinealynx.info/eyes.html#signs
 
Thanks. I've been looking at guinea lynx, its a great source of info. There aren't any photos on there that match what she has, bit it does sound like the generalised "milky opaque" look to it that seems to happen if there's any trauma to a piggys eyes. She's completely herself so I'm hoping she'll be OK until morning. I'm a little wary of poking it about (even with the saline solution) as she can be very scatty if anything out of the ordinary happens. My local vet surgery is closed on a Saturday (well, it's open, but there's no vet - useful!) so she's going to have to do a 30min car journey to their sister surgery - which she's never done before. I'm a bit worried about the stress on her as she can be a nervy pig. It's why she's my very special pig cos she's come such a long way in the last year to being a cautious but really lovely girl.

Lynda - you weren't sharp, its fine :) It can be frustrating if people don't seem to take their pets best interests into consideration.
 
Please take a companion with her as "paw holder". Both piggies will be much less stressed that way. My specialist vet is a 30 minutes railway journey from me, and the piggies are coping fine.
 
Yes, I thought it'd be best to take them both together otherwise they might get confused without one another.
 
Hey

So I went this morning. I was very impressed by the vet, she was really good with my girl. She wasn't 100% sure on the cause of the problem with the eye - she had a few theories. She gave it a good look though, and put some dye in it to look for something (I think an ulcer), gave it a good clean out. There was a good bit of gunk and a long sliter of hay came out of the eye - so we're both hoping it was that and now the eye just need to heal.

I've been prescribed for the next 5 days: eye drops 3 times a day, baytril twice a day, and Metcam once a day (in a very tiny dose: .2) She wants to see Emily back on Wednesday to see if there's an improvement and plan a next step.

She did show me how to administer the drugs through syringe, but is there any real secret to it or any tips anyone has to a first time syringe user and eye-drop administrator?
 
Piggylet said:
Hey

So I went this morning. I was very impressed by the vet, she was really good with my girl. She wasn't 100% sure on the cause of the problem with the eye - she had a few theories. She gave it a good look though, and put some dye in it to look for something (I think an ulcer), gave it a good clean out. There was a good bit of gunk and a long sliter of hay came out of the eye - so we're both hoping it was that and now the eye just need to heal.

I've been prescribed for the next 5 days: eye drops 3 times a day, baytril twice a day, and Metcam once a day (in a very tiny dose: .2) She wants to see Emily back on Wednesday to see if there's an improvement and plan a next step.

She did show me how to administer the drugs through syringe, but is there any real secret to it or any tips anyone has to a first time syringe user and eye-drop administrator?
Click to expand...

Well done for seeing a vet promptly; eye pokes from hay can cause such horrible injuries, several piggies on here have lost eyes as a result :(

As for syringing meds, just draw up the correct amount using a 1ml syringe, the syringe should be marked 0.1, 0.2 etc. Then place the syringe inside the piggy's mouth directing the nozzle towards the inside of the cheek & squeeze gently, about 0.2ml at a time, giving the piggy a chance to swallow in between. As long as you don't squirt it directly to the back of the throat & do it gradually then that will be fine. Hope her eye is better soon :))
 
Thank you, I'm just about to give her the second dose of baytril, she didn't like it when the vet gave it to her (am I right in thinking most pigs don't like the taste of it?), so what on earth she's going to be like with a soft touch like me, I don't know.
 
My Toffee had a similar problem a few weeks ago. It was a grass seed stuck in her eye, causing an ulcer. We pulled the grass seed out at the vets and she had some eye drops. Within a few days, her eye was much better and she got a clean bill of health at her check up a week later. Fingers crossed all goes the same for you x
 
Fingers crossed I hope so! She's completely unfazed by it all, just going about her normal business! It's me doing all the worrying!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top