Home care and vet advice for recurrent UTI

[Ginger19]

Hello everyone! Happy New Year to everyone!
My boy Ray (5 yo neutered) has been with recurrent UTIs since I adopted him when he was 6 mo, he was very neglected. He has sludge on his bladder but nothing else. We have always treated him with the same antibiotics until the last time (november) he almost went in a GI stasis. He stopped eating but I caught him on time, stopped the antibiotics and everthing went fine.
Since that I made some changes in his diet. I put him on special urinary pellets of Buny Dreams (my vet recomended), I only feed him timothy hay and filtered water. His salad only contains low calcium vegetables and I gave him the urinary support treats of Oxbow. I mean, he had a low calcium diet before but now his is on the very spoiled and vigilant diet for his UT.
Now, he is again peeing with pain and a little of blood. I have begun supplementing with Critical Care and Animal Strath because, tbh, I don't trust him and I'm also weight him daily.
He hasn't loose any gram (even gained a little but is good for him because as neglected on his youth he is a small and skinny boy) nor his apetite but today he seems a little bit under the weather and complaining a little bit more when he pees.
We have a vet appointment set for tomorrow and the vet has asked me for a urine sample (btw, any tips to collect it? last time was a two long hours waiting for a good pee to catch...)
At this point I don't know what to do or what to ask for my vet. I don't know if it's good for him to try again with antibiotic (someone mentioned me Baytril the last time) or just pain reliefs (some UTIs he had, they went away by themselves).
So if someone has any kind of advice or experience with recurrent UTIs I would like to read how you and your vet manage them. And thank you so so so much in advance.
I really appreciate all the information on this forum, is gold.

Sorry for my typos, not my mother tonge!

 

[Wiebke]

Hello everyone! Happy New Year to everyone!
My boy Ray (5 yo neutered) has been with recurrent UTIs since I adopted him when he was 6 mo, he was very neglected. He has sludge on his bladder but nothing else. We have always treated him with the same antibiotics until the last time (november) he almost went in a GI stasis. He stopped eating but I caught him on time, stopped the antibiotics and everthing went fine.
Since that I made some changes in his diet. I put him on special urinary pellets of Buny Dreams (my vet recomended), I only feed him timothy hay and filtered water. His salad only contains low calcium vegetables and I gave him the urinary support treats of Oxbow. I mean, he had a low calcium diet before but now his is on the very spoiled and vigilant diet for his UT.
Now, he is again peeing with pain and a little of blood. I have begun supplementing with Critical Care and Animal Strath because, tbh, I don't trust him and I'm also weight him daily.
He hasn't loose any gram (even gained a little but is good for him because as neglected on his youth he is a small and skinny boy) nor his apetite but today he seems a little bit under the weather and complaining a little bit more when he pees.
We have a vet appointment set for tomorrow and the vet has asked me for a urine sample (btw, any tips to collect it? last time was a two long hours waiting for a good pee to catch...)
At this point I don't know what to do or what to ask for my vet. I don't know if it's good for him to try again with antibiotic (someone mentioned me Baytril the last time) or just pain reliefs (some UTIs he had, they went away by themselves).
So if someone has any kind of advice or experience with recurrent UTIs I would like to read how you and your vet manage them. And thank you so so so much in advance.
I really appreciate all the information on this forum, is gold.

Sorry for my typos, not my mother tonge!

Hi

I am very sorry for your problems.

Is your vet monitoring his sludge? Has it got worse? Please be aware that a diet too low in calcium can also cause problems. There is a sweet spot in the diet where the balance is correct and stable. How bad is the sludge? If the bladder is packed, then the effect is every bit as bad as that of a stone.

Once any other other potential problems in the urinary tract have been excluded, there is condition called sterile interstitial cystitis (i.e. a non-bacterial recurring bladder infection) in guinea pigs that is not well known outside vet circles dealing with lots of guinea pigs but that has actually overtaken common bacterial urine infections (UTIs, which are causes by faecal bacteria in the urinary tract and a trigger event, like sudden cold or dampness; which is why UTI is generally more common in outdoors piggies and in the Spring when piggies are put on the lawn too soon).

Sterile IC has become a lot more common over the last 15 years together with a shift to more indoors keeping and with the rise of commercial mass breeding. It seems to predominantly affect guinea pigs with a nervous disposition and seems to be comparable with feline sterile cystitis (FSC), if your vet is conversant with that. Treatment in guinea pigs is comparable to that of cats.
Sterile IC seems to mainly affect the glucosamine layer which coats the walls of the urinary tract and which prevents the very corrosive urine from coming into contact with the raw tissue in the walls. Piggies with sterile IC are usually found to have no or only a small load bacteria (which is the reason why antibiotics can only temporarily suppress it in its milder to medium forms but not cure it) but as the symptoms of all problems in the urinary tract are very similar, it is very often diagnosed by default when everything else has been excluded. Characteristic for sterile IC are its regular flares every few weeks to every few months.

Treatment is mainly with glucosamine - orally in the mild to medium range - or more recently for the more severe forms with cartrophen by your vet, which recent research has found to also work for guinea pigs. This in combination with metacam (meloxicam).
For the milder cases, we recommend using cat bladder supplement capsules for ease of use, as you mix the contents of 1 capsule with 2 ml of water and give either all once daily or 1 ml of the solution twice daily). The UK brand is feliway for cats but I am sure that you have comparable products in Spain, which are not classed as a medication so your vet may not prescribe them but may be able to point you to a suitable product. But in a pinch a human glucosamine supplement will also do. You have to work out the individual dosage though and the taste is not great.

You will have to work out which maintenance level of metacam and glucosamine is adequate for your guinea pig and how far you have to up the dosage in a flare to get the symptoms back under control quickly. In my personal experience, upping the glucosamine shortly is more effective than upping the metacam. Please accept that it will take several weeks for the additional glucosamine supplement to get to work but once that has happened you can then work out just how much regular support your piggy will need and how to deal best with any flares. Sterile IC comes in a whole spectrum of severity from the very mild to the really severe so you will have to work out for yourself just how low you can go between flares and how high you need to go during a flare-up of symptoms.

Unfortunately, sterile IC cannot be healed, only managed. It may eventually go away on its own if you are lucky, but you are rather looking at years than months. Companions can catch it but are in my own experience able to fend it off with their own immune system without ever developing any acute symptoms unless they have also experienced their mother's high stress levels as their default 'normal' while still in the womb.

Here is a bit more information on sterile IC: Links - Interstitial Cystitis - Guinea Lynx Records

Please contact your vet and discuss this with them. We cannot diagnose sight unseen; we can only show you avenues you may want to pursue with your vet.

All the best.

 

[Ginger19]

Hi

I am very sorry for your problems.

Is your vet monitoring his sludge? Has it got worse? Please be aware that a diet too low in calcium can also cause problems. There is a sweet spot in the diet where the balance is correct and stable. How bad is the sludge? If the bladder is packed, then the effect is every bit as bad as that of a stone.

Once any other other potential problems in the urinary tract have been excluded, there is condition called sterile interstitial cystitis (i.e. a non-bacterial recurring bladder infection) in guinea pigs that is not well known outside vet circles dealing with lots of guinea pigs but that has actually overtaken common bacterial urine infections (UTIs, which are causes by faecal bacteria in the urinary tract and a trigger event, like sudden cold or dampness; which is why UTI is generally more common in outdoors piggies and in the Spring when piggies are put on the lawn too soon).

Sterile IC has become a lot more common over the last 15 years together with a shift to more indoors keeping and with the rise of commercial mass breeding. It seems to predominantly affect guinea pigs with a nervous disposition and seems to be comparable with feline sterile cystitis (FSC), if your vet is conversant with that. Treatment in guinea pigs is comparable to that of cats.
Sterile IC seems to mainly affect the glucosamine layer which coats the walls of the urinary tract and which prevents the very corrosive urine from coming into contact with the raw tissue in the walls. Piggies with sterile IC are usually found to have no or only a small load bacteria (which is the reason why antibiotics can only temporarily suppress it in its milder to medium forms but not cure it) but as the symptoms of all problems in the urinary tract are very similar, it is very often diagnosed by default when everything else has been excluded. Characteristic for sterile IC are its regular flares every few weeks to every few months.

Treatment is mainly with glucosamine - orally in the mild to medium range - or more recently for the more severe forms with cartrophen by your vet, which recent research has found to also work for guinea pigs. This in combination with metacam (meloxicam).
For the milder cases, we recommend using cat bladder supplement capsules for ease of use, as you mix the contents of 1 capsule with 2 ml of water and give either all once daily or 1 ml of the solution twice daily). The UK brand is feliway for cats but I am sure that you have comparable products in Spain, which are not classed as a medication so your vet may not prescribe them but may be able to point you to a suitable product. But in a pinch a human glucosamine supplement will also do. You have to work out the individual dosage though and the taste is not great.

You will have to work out which maintenance level of metacam and glucosamine is adequate for your guinea pig and how far you have to up the dosage in a flare to get the symptoms back under control quickly. In my personal experience, upping the glucosamine shortly is more effective than upping the metacam. Please accept that it will take several weeks for the additional glucosamine supplement to get to work but once that has happened you can then work out just how much regular support your piggy will need and how to deal best with any flares. Sterile IC comes in a whole spectrum of severity from the very mild to the really severe so you will have to work out for yourself just how low you can go between flares and how high you need to go during a flare-up of symptoms.

Unfortunately, sterile IC cannot be healed, only managed. It may eventually go away on its own if you are lucky, but you are rather looking at years than months. Companions can catch it but are in my own experience able to fend it off with their own immune system without ever developing any acute symptoms unless they have also experienced their mother's high stress levels as their default 'normal' while still in the womb.

Here is a bit more information on sterile IC: Links - Interstitial Cystitis - Guinea Lynx Records

Please contact your vet and discuss this with them. We cannot diagnose sight unseen; we can only show you avenues you may want to pursue with your vet.

All the best.

Thank you so much for your response, and I'm sorry for my delaying but here we are still celebrating some Christmas holidays and it's been a busy week.

I read about sterile IC the last time I had this problem and asked my vet about it. Because of Ray's medical records and some bacterial cultures along with a lot of tests she determined this recurrents UTIs are because of his neglected youth and the sludge he has as result of this.

Ray was in an ilegal breeding center and the police take him to the vet were I was working (i'm a veterinary nurse) along with more than 50 piggies in really bad shape. We had to put to sleep a lot of them because they were suffering a lot and for me was one of the worst moments of my career. It was devastating. I fell in love with Ray because he is such a noble and gentle boy and he was always left behind by his cagemates (he is very submissive), so I adopted him. I already had two more lady piggies so I neutered him while quarantine because he had mites and everything you can imagine.

The vet that went with the police told us they feed the guinea pigs just with straw, icerberg lettuce, tomatoes and horse pellets. Because this place was in the back of an equestrian center. You can imagine that even the quality of this bad food was even worse because everything was the discards of the horses.
Ray had his first UTI when he was around 8 mo and he already had sludge. I had controlled it for 5 years with my vet and it went kinda well until the last time he went on GI stasis. That's why I changed his diet but I still feed him with enough calcium, don't worry.

I took the urine sample to the vet and she confirmed the infecction. We are now in Baytril and Meloxicam and he is doing fantastic because he is not in pain and his appetite and weight are intact.

About glucosamine, as I have understood, would it help to preserve the bladder tissue in URIs? I'll ask my vet again about this but I would to hear more about you and your vet's advice if you are used to use it. Here we have feliway as well so I can look for it.

Thank you so much again!

 

[Wiebke]

Thank you so much for your response, and I'm sorry for my delaying but here we are still celebrating some Christmas holidays and it's been a busy week.

I read about sterile IC the last time I had this problem and asked my vet about it. Because of Ray's medical records and some bacterial cultures along with a lot of tests she determined this recurrents UTIs are because of his neglected youth and the sludge he has as result of this.

Ray was in an ilegal breeding center and the police take him to the vet were I was working (i'm a veterinary nurse) along with more than 50 piggies in really bad shape. We had to put to sleep a lot of them because they were suffering a lot and for me was one of the worst moments of my career. It was devastating. I fell in love with Ray because he is such a noble and gentle boy and he was always left behind by his cagemates (he is very submissive), so I adopted him. I already had two more lady piggies so I neutered him while quarantine because he had mites and everything you can imagine.

The vet that went with the police told us they feed the guinea pigs just with straw, icerberg lettuce, tomatoes and horse pellets. Because this place was in the back of an equestrian center. You can imagine that even the quality of this bad food was even worse because everything was the discards of the horses.
Ray had his first UTI when he was around 8 mo and he already had sludge. I had controlled it for 5 years with my vet and it went kinda well until the last time he went on GI stasis. That's why I changed his diet but I still feed him with enough calcium, don't worry.

I took the urine sample to the vet and she confirmed the infecction. We are now in Baytril and Meloxicam and he is doing fantastic because he is not in pain and his appetite and weight are intact.

About glucosamine, as I have understood, would it help to preserve the bladder tissue in URIs? I'll ask my vet again about this but I would to hear more about you and your vet's advice if you are used to use it. Here we have feliway as well so I can look for it.

Thank you so much again!

The wall tissue of the urinary tract is not as much affected in urine infections but bladder stones banging around in the bladder during a pee or scraping along the walls of the ureter or urethra can cause painful damage.

Sterile IC (which is a very different thing from a bacterial urine infection) is a very different thing but you can give it a try. Just don't expect immediate or even noticeable results.


But I am very glad that your boy is responding well. Would your vet consider a longer run of baytril in case it returns soon after? Getting on top of a urine infection can sometimes take 3 weeks with baytril and 4 weeks with bactrim (USA)/Sulfatrim (UK) in our long term forum experience?

 

[Ginger19]

The wall tissue of the urinary tract is not as much affected in urine infections but bladder stones banging around in the bladder during a pee or scraping along the walls of the ureter or urethra can cause painful damage.

Sterile IC (which is a very different thing from a bacterial urine infection) is a very different thing but you can give it a try. Just don't expect immediate or even noticeable results.


But I am very glad that your boy is responding well. Would your vet consider a longer run of baytril in case it returns soon after? Getting on top of a urine infection can sometimes take 3 weeks with baytril and 4 weeks with bactrim (USA)/Sulfatrim (UK) in our long term forum experience?

Thank you so much for your response and again, sorry for my delay.

Ray is doing really good. After reading you (because I read you but I didn't answered), I asked my vet about a long treatment with baytril and we are doing it! At day 9 he showed again signs of discomfort and blood in the pee but it was just one day and he has being gaining weith and I think he really feels better. I hope we can ended this treatment at 15 days (it'll end this monday), but I'm not really worried about if we need to keep it to a month because I can see this is really good for him.
Thank you so much for your advice, it made a change for my boy and I.

 

[Wiebke]

Thank you so much for your response and again, sorry for my delay.

Ray is doing really good. After reading you (because I read you but I didn't answered), I asked my vet about a long treatment with baytril and we are doing it! At day 9 he showed again signs of discomfort and blood in the pee but it was just one day and he has being gaining weith and I think he really feels better. I hope we can ended this treatment at 15 days (it'll end this monday), but I'm not really worried about if we need to keep it to a month because I can see this is really good for him.
Thank you so much for your advice, it made a change for my boy and I.

All the best!

PS: If the problem returns again some time after the full course of antibiotics, please contact us again and we will help you with further avenues and practical support.