• 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

Mysterious Weight Loss Seems To Be Getting Worse

Status
Not open for further replies.
Bit frustrated. Turns out the only gpig vet at my local is on his way to Australia so wouldn't have been there for the appt anyway. Because of that I've no idea if it would be a good idea to book him into the vet tomorrow in case the cat/dog vet misdiagnoses. Ginny's brighter right now.

Thing I've noticed is that after syringe feeding his wheeking is somewhat raspy? I'm not sure how to describe it. It's definitely not his breathing. His wheeking is clear now after a while of not syringe feeding but I'm wondering if I'm syringe feeding wrong or what.
 
Incredibly stressed. He's puffing up and I had to massage him for gas. Funeral in two or less hours, I'm not sure what vet to leave him wth since my vet is now on holiday adN I've no idea how good the dog vet is there. I can't leave him alone how he is
 
I took him to the vet about 20-30 minutes before the funeral, I had to take them to the veterinary hospital nearby, my mum went to the opening after it moved and they are nice. Didn't risk Pakefield vet as my vet is on holiday and worried they'd inject him wrongly, so took a small risk ad trusted them a bit after the vet said he needed to go immediately if it was bloat. Turned out to be a gassy episode which settled by the time we got to the vet. Receptionist were lovely. Vet prescribed baytril and emeprid or what's it called? I wasn't sure if it was bad and plan on giving it to him when I return in case the baytril made him stop eating. Very antsy as I want to go home to him but can only get a ride home within the hour
 
Also as Baytril is harsh on the gut, would emeprid help/soothe it?

I have some pro-antibiotic but Minja stopped eating after I gave it too her and I always worry the same will happen to him
 
0.12 mls twice a day of Baytril
0.6 mls twice a day of emeprid

I'm wondering if the instructions were printed wrong as I remember the receptionist pointing at the syringe to show me how much to give of one and pointed at a 0. mls number and then went "and two of those small lines over"

I'm not sure about the emeprid but that seems like a lot of Baytril? He did weigh 650g at the vet though, and went up to 660g by the time I got home. I've given him the 0.6mls of emeprid but haven't given any Baytril yet
 
Last edited:
0.12 of baytril doesn't sound like too much to me. Isobel has pneumonia in February and prior to getting her to Simon my vet prescribe Baytril at 0.28ml twice daily and she was around 700g from not eating. Start giving the baytril straight away as Ginny clearly needs medication.

I would say that, given you were concerned about possible kidney failure, I had a piggy with this a few years back. Bea was always a larger lady over 1100g but started to lose weight, she did have cysts which burst but in the investigations she was found to be losing protein through her urine and diabetes was ruled out through urine tests. I was told it was highly likely renal failure but the only way to be certain was expensive blood tests and then there would be no treatment available anyway. I didn't go through with the tests and she lost weight until she weighed just 600g but she maintained this weight for the rest of her life which turned out to be another 18 months as it happens
 
Thank you xx my mind is absolutely not working today so please excuse my horrible maths. So I'd do 0,6 and then another 0,6 mls which would equal 1.2? Or just count up twelve from the little lines which would be ? Again please excuse me, minds not working at all

Thank you Elisabeth and everyone who's been so nice xx it went off ok, people cried as expected but by the end everyone was talking about memories so it was sweet
 
You said 0.12ml the first time which is a tiny amount, as in the photo.

Give him the dose as the vet said and ask them tomorrow if the dose is right.

Adding probiotic is good, but if you want to you can monitor his eating first. If the antibiotics put him off food at all, step in with probiotics and syringe feeding if necessary.

20170524_192558.webp
 
Thank you xx that helps a lot. Just wondering, bit nervous I've overdosed on the emeprid. I did 0.6 mls on the actual syringe rather than the smaller dots. I'm not sure much got into him anyway as he protested in any case but still
 
You need to understand that the syringes are usually 1ml syringes. 0.12ml is the first big line and two of the tiny lines as in Jayceys photo. 0.6ml is 6 of the big lines. I have never used emeprid so cannot comment on the dosage. If you do not know how to safely medicate your piggy (i.e. how the numbers on the syringe match the dosage you have been told to give) then you should go back to your vet to be shown
 
That's quite a high dose of Emeprid but not unheard of. Here's the syringe for that one.

If he's not really gassy or bloated I'd query that dose with the vet tomorrow too, see if it can be reduced a little. 0.3ml twice a day was the dose my boar had. He didn't bloat up massively but he did had gas on occasion.

20170524_193706.webp
 
Thank you xx I had a misunderstanding about the syringes, thank you for clearing it up. I'll still ring the vet and most likely go back to make sure I'll defintely be syringe feeding properly from now on. Feel a bit embarrassed must be honest lol, thought I'd have this understood after owning piggies for this long. I'll keep an eye on him in case the bad dosage of emeprid acts up

I thought he had bloat as it was quite bad for him. It didn't go away until we reached the vets, unless it was just a coincidence is it possible car rides do anything to soothe it? Like the vibrations as his carrier was on the floor

Also will query with one of my vets about an urine test to rule out diabetes
 
Car rides can help loads. I've taken a bloaty pig out for a car ride a few times and it's helped shake the poops out!

We can all learn something new and helpful about pigs so don't worry about not knowing everything. If you're ever in doubt about doses or anything, feel free to ask the vet at your appointment. That's whag they're there for.
 
Oh, that's interesting! I'll keep that in mind. He was all hunched and his stomach sounded akin to bloat when tapped, just as we reached the vet his stomach was back to normal

Thank you, I appreciate it x I'll have to ask him to show me syringe feeding.
To be honest I used them as an emergency and they are great, but they seem to edge towards pts quite a bit as he's getting older. He was very kind which I appreciated, but didn't really like how it was more leave him to rest than see what's the problem when he is still bright eyed. Ive had him for a long time and unless it'd be me just keeping him alive in severe pain for selfish reasons, I don't see any reason to put down a boy with a few issues.

And oh, your picture just loaded. That was the amount I gave him. I confused the 0,12mls misunderstanding with 0.6mls being under that therefore thinking I overdosed him. sorry, it's been a long day
 
Appointments were mixed up so no Taverham vet today :( I don't think I am going back to the emergency vet. Ginny has been incredibly hard to syringe feed as expected and peed on me four times during the Emeprid and Baytril. He's been eating very good and bright eyed.

Unfortunately I think what triggered his gas yesterday was eating the DualCare in pellet form. I gave him some in pellet form a bit ago and his poos have not been good and a tad bit gassy so I'm going to have to refuse veg tonight, hopefully that doesn't effect his weight or attitude too much
 
Been over 700g for two days :D he's about roughly 730g right now and running about and wheeking near me as I speak (girls are eating pellets so I've taken him out). And that's without me giving him any DualCare syringe feed today. Going to make up some later. To think I even considered putting him down on Wednesday

While I syringe fed him the Baytril and Emeprid, my mum rang up Taverham. They do blood and urine tests, but she forgot to ask for prices so going to have to do that later lol.
 
On a less brighter note, blood :( at least I think it is. Currently have Ginny on a puppy pad wait for a wee. Unless it's pigmentation from the red pepper given recently, but I don't remember giving him some, only to the girls unless they left behind a bit in the cage

Edit; no blood thankfully, but makes me double confused. I first found the suspected blood outside the cage, which right now only Giny has been walking around. There's pee spots on the cage that look orangey when dried and the puppy pads under are red ish looking. Examples
image.webp image.webp
 
Last edited:
About £5.75 for a urine test with the usual test stick, they said they do that before going to a blood test depending on results. Does this sound right? How long does it take to get the results from the stick?

Also saw Peppa pee, no signs of pain or blood so that's a relief. Of course she does it right next to Ginny while he's drinking and ignoring her lol

Hope it's ok to tag @Wiebke feeling a bit out of my depth. Feel free to ignore if you haven't the time right now xx
 
The wee on the puppy pad is fine. You can't look for blood on those because of the chemicals in the pads make wee go crazy colours.

You need to them to pee on a white towel or white kitchen roll to see if there is blood.

A urine stick test has instant results. My vet does it in most appointments and did it to my pig last week. They'll express a bit of wee out of Ginny, then put a bit of the test strip. It'll change colour and they'll use the pictures on the side of the bottle to confirm blood, protein etc.

They're not massively accurate but can give you a hint of any problems.

@CarnivalPiggy
 
CarnivalPiggy said:
On a less brighter note, blood :( at least I think it is. Currently have Ginny on a puppy pad wait for a wee. Unless it's pigmentation from the red pepper given recently, but I don't remember giving him some, only to the girls unless they left behind a bit in the cage

Edit; no blood thankfully, but makes me double confused. I first found the suspected blood outside the cage, which right now only Giny has been walking around. There's pee spots on the cage that look orangey when dried and the puppy pads under are red ish looking. Examples
View attachment 64040 View attachment 64041
Click to expand...

The pee looks normal to me for oxidised pee. Please be aware that blood doesn't mix with urine, so it appears either as small reddish dots in the middle of a puddle or - if there is more blood in the pee - a rim with a distinctively different hue around the edge. A darker ring of the same hue is just drying pee. I can't see either.

But you have also be aware that bloody looking pees cannot contain any traces of blood while clear pees can score high on a test stick (which you will know the result of within a minute or so). It would be nice if things would be straight forward, but they aren't quite. Intense hues in pee that exits the body clear are not at all uncommon in guinea pigs that have had either a bad bout of urinary problems or that have chronic issues. You are by far not the first that is confused. These hues are usually caused by a different variety of bacteria present in the bladder that is normally kept unser control by a fully operational immune system. :(
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top