Human Cystitis Treatment?

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LeahsPiggies

LeahsPiggies

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Hi everyone,

I would normally post this in the Health section, but since i've posted a few times in there I don't want to cramp it up and take the focus off other needy piggie owners!

Basically, I was just wondering if there are any human treatments that can be used for piggies instead of septrin etc from a vet.

All 3 were in the vet yesterday for xrays and ultrasounds - Pringles has a cystic ovary.. And the other 2 just have a sore/sensitive bladder and have the symptoms of cystitis. The vet didn't prescribe us any antibiotics yet, just potassium citrate to di-acidify urine and make their weeing more comfortable. I have been researching today and am 99% sure Porche especially, has cystitis.

The vet is 20 minutes away (exotic specialist Molly Varga) therefore it is a pain coming back and to for medication. Obviously it's not an issue if needs be, but I have heard human treatment can be effective with guinea pigs and was wondering if it was worth a try, or if anyone has had any experiences with it.

Thank you!
 
Food with extract of cranberry such as vetcare multimodal food is believed to possibly help,as well as making sure your piggy is kept hydrated - human treatments shouldnt be used without your vets guidance,as human medicines tend to get juggled about a bit by the manufactures,so something that Peter Gurney may have recommended years ago in his piggy potions book probably wouldnt be relevant today because the manufacturers have subsituted or revamped it.I add a little unsweetened cranberry juice to my guinea pigs drinking water as it encourages my boar to drink and therefore dilutes urine (cranberries are also anti oxidant) - I also think I have read on here that some people boil pearl barley and give the water to piggies to drink as this is supposed to help - but you would probably need to make it fresh daily - I wouldnt do anything without your vets approval though - hope the wiggies are better soon - I found changing to a low calcium food and veg diet & putting the cranberry juice in the water worked for mine.
 
So the cystitis definitely won't clear up without antibiotics prescribed by a vet? I will definitely be giving the cranberry juice a go aswell as continuing with the potassium citrate until we can get them into the vet again. It's a shame that everything has to result in vet treatment :(
 
If it is interstitial cystitis cranberry can actually make it worse, I posted a link a while ago and can find it again if needed. I also know of a pig that haemmoraged blood after being given cranberry juice as they had very bad interstitial cystitis.

If it is an actual infection then it is different. There are 2 types of cystitis that can get lumped together.

If it is an infection then I have used Canesten Oasis alongside Septrin.
 
Oh dear :( we literally have no more money to go to the vets! £200 on our bunny and £100 on the piggies in the space of a few weeks.. I really want to try home remedies but I don't want to make it worse!
 
You could try vegetarian glucosamine, is similar to Cystease. But I would find out first which type of cystitis it is. Interstitial is inflammation of the bladder. Many people do recommend cranberry but I personally would not use it on my pigs.

What dry food do you feed? and what veg? What are the symptoms that make you think it's cysitis?
 
Could you not ring your vets and find out what type of cystitis it is? I know I feed mine extra lettuce leaves to compliment their veggies as its packed full of water
 
I feed the pets at home nuggets, they were reccomended to me as they contain healthy ingredients and no lucerne (alfalfa)! Porche is on gerty guinea pig muesli mixed in though as she won't eat any pellets on their own :(

If I call the vets they'll just tell me to go in again, it's a 20 minute drive and a consultation alone is £30 and we've forked out so much this last month. Of course if needs be we'll take them again - They wern't actually diagnosed with cystitis the vet just said it's a possibility but only gave us potassium citrate and no antibiotics which is why I was looking to try and treat the cystitis myself! Will be getting hold of some metacam too!

(I spent all of yesterday researching about cystitis and i'm 99.9% sure they have it!)
 
I feel for you, I really do :(

I once had a piggy who had chronic bladder problems that we could never get to the bottom of and control.

Sometimes Connie would have blood in her urine which indicated an infection which Septrin and metacam cleared up and other times she squeaked when peeing, had an abnormal amount of crystals in her urine but no blood.

My vet was very against giving cranberry juice concerned acid would aggravate her bladder further.

The first x ray she had showed nothing but the second one showed a very inflamed bladder and lots of sludge.

As this had been going on for 5 months, I finally gave permission for her to be operated on.

Connie was given a bladder flush and she was much better afterwards. However, sadly for us it wasn't meant to be and she died 5 days later although it could have been through natural causes.

In that time, I spent close to £500 so I know where you are coming from regarding cost.

I really do hope that you get to the bottom of things soon.

Is their any other muesli type food you could feed? I have a piggy who won't touch nuggets for long periods of time so has Wagg guinea pig crunch with nuggets mixed in. Unfortunately, Gerty has unnecessary colourings and additives added and is to be honest, probably one of the worst muesli type foods on the market.

P.s Cheshire pets is my own vets preferred practise for specialist advise and referrals. My own vet is currently waiting for a phone call from Molly for suggestions on where we go next with Eliza's eye socket problems.
 
Last edited:
Clare, am pleased someone else agrees that cranberry juice can aggravate things.

My pigs were on Pets at Home pellets when Johnny got his stone. I would change if you can. Am preparing a spreadsheet on pellets but have not got their nutritional data yet but the ingredients are not good especially fir bladder pigs.

I am feeding Bunny meadowfeast guinea pig food from Zooplus and it seems to be having a good affect on those with IC.
 
I recommend the Bunny. Need to break the pellets up though.
 
@helen105281 sorry to be a pest again. I have given Quinn 1ml of Canesten Oasis tonight but to be honest I'm not sure how much to give him. I have made it up to 200ml like the packaging says. What would you recommend? Thank you again x
 
helen105281 said:
I would think you can go up to at least 5ml.
Click to expand...

I'll give it a try, I'm hoping it helps until it clears up. If he's still squealing when pooping tomorrow he's going back the vet. Thankfully it's only 35 minutes on the bus x
 
Hopefully he'll take it ok. My pigs would drink the whole jug if I let them.
 
helen105281 said:
Hopefully he'll take it ok. My pigs would drink the whole jug if I let them.
Click to expand...

He was being a bit fussy with the 1ml to be honest. Not really surprised since I think it tastes and smells vile! Your pigs must like the taste haha.
 
Hi Leah

Cystitis is either
a) bacterial in origin (diagnosed by a culture/antibiotic sensitivity test of wee taken directly from the bladder with a syringe/needle - a process called cystocentesis) or
b) non-specific inflammation from e.g. bladder sludge/crystals/stone (diagnosed by microscopic analysis of wee and X ray) and often termed interstitial cystitis or
c) other irritation/cell invasion such as tumour/lymphoma of the bladder wall more commonly seen on ultrasound or biopsy

All require pain relief and anti-inflammatory (Metacam).

I'm not going to address (c) in this post further as I don;t think it's relevant.

a) The bacterial form requires the right antibiotic and can also be treated with cranberry (which reduces the ability of the bacteria to bind to the bladder wall)

b) May require a bladder flush to remove the sludge or op to remove a stone. On a more general level, the crystals/sludge are insoluble calcium salts precipitating out in the urine - mainly as calcium carbonate. By giving citrate - this competes with the carbonate to bind to the calcium. Unlike calcium carbonate, calcium citrate is soluble so doesn't precipitate in the urine as crystals/sludge to irritate the bladder and is just excreted normally with no ill effects

You already have potassium citrate prescribed by the vet - this is no different from the other human "citrate" cystitis treatments including Oasis.
However, bear in mind that one other thing the human treatments are designed to do is to reduce the acidity of human urine so it doesn;t "sting" so much. i.e. make it more alkaline (hence why they are sodium rather than potassium citrate) ...and this is directed at human bacterial cystitis with a view to making the conditions less favourable (i.e. more alkaline) for human bacteria to grow.
BUT.....unlike in humans..... guinea pig urine is already very alkaline - which is why they are prone to sludge/stone formation in the first place. Therefore human treatments with sodium MAY NOT BE HELPFUL.

The most effective "home treatments" therefore in your current situation, given you are already medicating with potassium citrate (and hopefully metacam?) are
a) Pellets- reduce pellets or try a different pellet -
b) Veg: monitor Ca/Phospate ratio of greens (i.e. reduce spinach etc)
c) Water: - filter water or buy reduced calcium bottled water and more importantly syringe extra water to "flush" the bladder

And finally - (this one I think is most relevant to what you are looking for):
d) the famous "pearl barley gloop". Boil up pearl barley in water until very soft (30-60mins) - keep adding water to the pan if necessary. Strain off and KEEP the water - store in fridge and syringe feed over 48 hours but no more as it goes off. This acts as an emollient on the bladder lining and "soothes" the pain and distress. (Also the barley itself can be fed in small quantities to piggesi if they are losing weight)

Suggest however that before you give ANY home treatments you seek to do this with the agreement/involvement of your vet.

HTH
x
 
Pebble said:
Hi Leah

Cystitis is either
a) bacterial in origin (diagnosed by a culture/antibiotic sensitivity test of wee taken directly from the bladder with a syringe/needle - a process called cystocentesis) or
b) non-specific inflammation from e.g. bladder sludge/crystals/stone (diagnosed by microscopic analysis of wee and X ray) and often termed interstitial cystitis or
c) other irritation/cell invasion such as tumour/lymphoma of the bladder wall more commonly seen on ultrasound or biopsy

All require pain relief and anti-inflammatory (Metacam).

I'm not going to address (c) in this post further as I don;t think it's relevant.

a) The bacterial form requires the right antibiotic and can also be treated with cranberry (which reduces the ability of the bacteria to bind to the bladder wall)

b) May require a bladder flush to remove the sludge or op to remove a stone. On a more general level, the crystals/sludge are insoluble calcium salts precipitating out in the urine - mainly as calcium carbonate. By giving citrate - this competes with the carbonate to bind to the calcium. Unlike calcium carbonate, calcium citrate is soluble so doesn't precipitate in the urine as crystals/sludge to irritate the bladder and is just excreted normally with no ill effects

You already have potassium citrate prescribed by the vet - this is no different from the other human "citrate" cystitis treatments including Oasis.
However, bear in mind that one other thing the human treatments are designed to do is to reduce the acidity of human urine so it doesn;t "sting" so much. i.e. make it more alkaline (hence why they are sodium rather than potassium citrate) ...and this is directed at human bacterial cystitis with a view to making the conditions less favourable (i.e. more alkaline) for human bacteria to grow.
BUT.....unlike in humans..... guinea pig urine is already very alkaline - which is why they are prone to sludge/stone formation in the first place. Therefore human treatments with sodium MAY NOT BE HELPFUL.

The most effective "home treatments" therefore in your current situation, given you are already medicating with potassium citrate (and hopefully metacam?) are
a) Pellets- reduce pellets or try a different pellet -
b) Veg: monitor Ca/Phospate ratio of greens (i.e. reduce spinach etc)
c) Water: - filter water or buy reduced calcium bottled water and more importantly syringe extra water to "flush" the bladder

And finally - (this one I think is most relevant to what you are looking for):
d) the famous "pearl barley gloop". Boil up pearl barley in water until very soft (30-60mins) - keep adding water to the pan if necessary. Strain off and KEEP the water - store in fridge and syringe feed over 48 hours but no more as it goes off. This acts as an emollient on the bladder lining and "soothes" the pain and distress. (Also the barley itself can be fed in small quantities to piggesi if they are losing weight)

Suggest however that before you give ANY home treatments you seek to do this with the agreement/involvement of your vet.

HTH
x
Click to expand...

Thank you very much for your advice, but this was posted in February. She didn't have Cystitis after all although is still undergoing veterinary treatment. X
 
Thanks Leah -

I do apologise for not realising this was a much earlier thread.

Glad cystitis wasn't the problem for your piggie but sorry to hear she is still under vet treatment.

Hope my reply will be useful for others if not yourself

x
 
Pebble said:
Thanks Leah -

I do apologise for not realising this was a much earlier thread.

Glad cystitis wasn't the problem for your piggie but sorry to hear she is still under vet treatment.

Hope my reply will be useful for others if not yourself

x
Click to expand...

I feel awful now because you wrote such an informative post! I did read it all though and it's very helpful to me and others and I will be sure to go back to it for future reference :) xx
 
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