How successful is bladder stone removal operation

[Hare Lane]

Hello. Can anyone help me please as I cannot seem to find out the answer to my question anywhere else. My lovely Guinea Pig aged 3 yrs, had to be put to sleep 2 weeks ago following an operation 2 weeks previously to remove a bladder stone.
He seemed to be getting better to start with and every avenue was tried to restore him to health but it was decided to spare him from more suffering.

The vet suspected an abcess adjacent to his wound, dispite being on antibiotics and anti-inflammatory drugs. We are so upset at losing him this way. In the vets own words he was such a little fighter. He came to us as one of a badly paired boars, not related, and slightly differing ages.

Can anyone tell me if this operation is ever successful. It seemed such drastic surgery for such a small animal but it was his only chance and so we took it.

 

[paulag]

It's very easy to second guess yourself when you try something like this but it's very difficult to know what the right thing to do is in these situations. You took the decision to try an operation that had a chance of curing his problem, made sure he had good vetinary care and were brave enough to make the decision to let him go when he was in pain. Really that's all he could have asked for.

I don't know what the success rate of this operation is, but all surgery has a certain amount of risk. Bladder stones are painful and I suspect your only other choice would have been to have him put to sleep.

Over the years I've had small animals survive quite heroic surgery (the spaying if a Persian jird with a womb infection stands out), but also had occasions where quite minor surgery has resulted in serious problems. All you can do is to make the best decision that you can, with the information you have at the time.

 

[Freela]

((HUGS))- I'm so sorry for your loss. I haven't faced surgery for bladder stones, but I did lose a piggie to an abscess in the jawbone and I know how devastating it was to see her waste away and die in spite of syringe feeding, two operations to try to save her, etc. Abscesses, particularly those that are deep and not surface infections, are nasty... in my pig's case she had maloccluded teeth which led to an infection down in the tooth root and it spread to her jawbone and led to septicemia (blood poisoning) in spite of antibiotics and having the abscess surgically lanced and cleaned out twice. It sounds like you gave him the best care you could and let him go out of compassion and love... that's about all you can do. Sadly, sometimes much as we try they just aren't strong enough to make it through.