Fungal infection?

[grindrod]

Hi everyone, sorry if this has already been covered before but we took Jacob to the vets on Tuesday as he had some hair loss on one of his hips, he had granular scurf around his bottom, greasy fur and his fur was coming out in tufts with skin/scurf attached.

The vet diagnosed mites and treated him with Xeno 450, later that day he was stretching round biting his back when he had a fit.

I spoke to the vet a couple of days later wondering if it was a fungal infection, he saw nothing wrong with treating him for a fungal infection so long as it was at least 48 hours after the Xeno had been applied.

We waited 72 hours (Friday afternoon) then treated him with Coco-Neem melt, he was in great pain as we applied it but within minutes he calmed down and was quite happy for the 20 minutes that we left the oil on him, we then shampooed him with the Manuka-Neem Shampoo and he was getting stressed so we quickly rinsed him and wrapped him in a towel, we didn't manage to get all the oil off him.

Today (Saturday) he has been much more like his old self, he has been eating well, chatting away and generally in good spirits.

His collar was still oily and he did occasionally shake his head as if it was irritating him, this evening however he started shaking his head repeatedly about 5 times a minute, then he had a fit.

We thought the oil might be irritating him so we scooped him up and shampooed him again tonight with a good rinse, his skin is very red around his neck.

We dried him gently with the towel and put him back in the cage where he has been fine, eating, chirping.

I am worried about the fits, and his skin on his neck is quite red, what should we do next?

Thanks in advance, Martin

 

[MemberY]

Hi Martin
not a vet by any means but it does sound more like a fungal infection.
Your vet was spot on treating for mites first and allowing 48 hours before treating for fungal. Both of these are extremely painful for the guinea and both can cause fits. I am assuming you got the products for the fungal from Gorgeous Guineas? I would suggest emailing her (she is also a qualified rodentologist) for further advice via her website. She does a lotion to use between shampoos to ease the symptoms.

Best of luck x

 

[wind1]

I had this with one of mine a few months ago. My vet treated for mites and didn't think it was fungal as "we rarely see fungal infections in guinea pigs" (his quote not mine). I was convinced it was fungal so I e-mailed Chrissie at GG and she was brilliant. It took a few weeks and a lot of lost hair (he was nearly bald bless him) but we got there. Good luck

http://www.gorgeousguineas.com/

 

[grindrod]

Hi Martin
not a vet by any means but it does sound more like a fungal infection.
Your vet was spot on treating for mites first and allowing 48 hours before treating for fungal. Both of these are extremely painful for the guinea and both can cause fits. I am assuming you got the products for the fungal from Gorgeous Guineas? I would suggest emailing her (she is also a qualified rodentologist) for further advice via her website. She does a lotion to use between shampoos to ease the symptoms.

Best of luck x

Thanks! Yes I got the products from GG and spoke to Chrissy, very helpful, I will email her with an update and check we are doing things right!
Today Jacob has been back to his old self and seems much happier and up to mischief, he has been picking up the kitchen roll tube and bashing Nibbles with it! naughty boy! he does it quite deliberately.

His skin around his neck is less red so I think we are moving in the right direction, I will ask Chrissy when we should oil him again.

Thanks for everything, Martin