Specialist Pig Often With Red Eye

[Trikoemela]

Hallo, I am new here, I am the happy owner of Triko, a neutered boar of one year and a half, and Mela, his ten months old girlfriend. I woudl like to ask whether other pig owners have a similar problem: Triko has been suffering from a red eye for a year now. When it started I took him to the vet, she gave him antibiotic eye drops and the redness passed. Then it came back after a month, and I gave him the same drops again. The vet said there are not many kinds of antibiotics for piggies and did non change them. As I said this problem has not solved;
this symptom comes and goes every few days, the eye is never swollen or closed but often has a whitish crust around it and the hair around it is always thin. The eye is more sensitive to the light than the other. Instead of always using antibiotics I clean it with warm water almost every day to take away the crust and it does not get worse; sometimes the eye is normal, then the following day is again red and I think a little sore too.
This autumn I had it checked with the vet again, she said it is a sensitiveness of the eye because Triko has white hair around that eye; she did not find anything alarming (checked teeth). She said to give antibiotics drops only when it gets worse.
Has anybody had a similar problem, and how did you treat the eye?

 

[Wiebke]

I have tagged our specialists for you. Could you please add your country to your details, as medical brands differ. This allows us to adapt any advice to what is available to you or to give the generic name of the main active substance instead of a country specific brand name to give to your vet. You add your country by clicking on your username on the top bar, then go to personal details and scroll down to location. Thanks; that will help a lot to speed things up!

It sounds indeed like the issue is not resolved and your (general) vet is at a loss of he is dealing with. There is only one officially licensed antibiotic, but there are now a variety of othersbeing used by exotic/specialist vets provided that you sign a form that you take any responsibility for the outcome.

@Pebble @Elwickcavies

 

[Trikoemela]

Thank you, I am from Italy, the name of the eye drops I used is Ribomicin, it contains gentamycin. The vet I saw is specialised in exotic pets, but I realise vets here may not be up to your standards; they do not see many guinea pigs as they are not a common pet in Italy as un the UK. Many people do not even know what a guinea pig is, a friend of mine thought I had two real pigs living in my house and was horrified! And when I add they are rodents people confuse them with hamsters.
the vet was so delighted to see my guinea pigs that she never charged me anything, said it was a pleasure to see them! She only charged me the first time, when I had Triko neutered.
I made sure I chose a vet from an approved list of exotic vets made by an Italian forum on guinea pigs, I could not do any better; in this forum, however, they promote C&C cages but also suggest pairing guinea pigs with rabbits, so as you can see there is still some way to go...

 

[Wiebke]

Thank you for adding your country, that will help a lot as we can adapt any advice. Our medications specialist will be hopefully coming on this evening.

Could you please tell me whether the redness is in the eye or in the lining around the eye? Would it be possible to post a picture of the eye. this will help us with any suggestions you could make to your vet.
https://www.theguineapigforum.co.uk/threads/how-to-post-photos.112751/ or just copy/paste a picture directly into your past that has been uploaded elsewhere.

 

[Trikoemela]

The redness is in the lining, today the eye is not red so unfortunately you cannot see the problem in the photo, but you should be able to see where the hair has thinned because it is often wet. If I put Triko under a light, even today when the eye is not red,he blinks only with that eye, so I guess it bothers him a bit. For the rest, his behaviour is normal. The lining of the other eye is brown but it is seldom wet and the hair has not thinned.
I forgot to say: I applied antibiotic drops for five days, one drop twice a day, only in the suffering eye. maybe the treatment should have lasted longer?

And then I can add: when I was in holiday for two weeks last summer, I left my piggies with my mother, who has never owned guineas and said she could not clean Triko's eyes because he would wriggle and squeal with her (very naughty piggy). As a result, when I came home the eye was crusty and half closed. I worried and applied antibiotic drops again (for the third and last time), the eye speedily got well (and stayed sonfor only a fortnight...).
Since then I have not given antibiotics but only cleaned regularly with water, it does not solve the problem but keeps it under control.

 

[Wiebke]

Conjunctivitis can be hard to treat in some cases. I hope that our experts can come up with some more things to try!

 

[Trikoemela]

Yes I know, it is sort of a minor problem but whenever I see him blinking I feel so concerned for him! And I am already starting to worry about the next holidays!

 

[Pebble]

Firstly - gentamycin eye drops are THE VERY BEST for pigies,

If they dont work it sounds like a mechanical/abrssive issue such as Entropion (incurled eyelash on the lids)...

....but we need pictures fist before making any further comment

x

 

[Elwickcavies]

I wonder whether the drops are helping to lubricate the eye, which is why it improves with the antibiotic (I agree with Pebble that gentamycin is the best antibiotic to use here). You can get eye lubricants - my vet gave me the one they use for animals during surgery to prevent the eye from drying out. As prey animals piggies tend not to blink very much and so a dry eye can cause problems and irritation. Has they vet checked for any damage or any foreign body in the eye? A photo when there is a problem would be very helpful, but I would also ask your vet about an eye lubricant.

 

[Trikoemela]

Today the eye is starting to show sings of the usual problems, so I thought I would post some photos. As you can see, the left eye ( with brown hair around it) is wide open, alert to the camera, and healthy. The right eye, with white hair aroud it, is blinking as if in pain. It also is a little watery and a white crust is starting to form, you should see it in the last photo. I just cleaned the eye and he is keeping it wide open again. I sometimes use artificial drops (the same we use for ourselves) with no lubrificant or other ingredients because I am afraid they might harm; they seem to work but do not solve the problem definitely.

 

[Trikoemela]

Today the eye is like yesterday, no improvement. Has anybody got a suggestion as to what I should do? Would you give antibiotic drops for a longer time, say seven days, or try eye lubrificant? Do your piggies ever have sore eyes? Any advice welcome

 

[Pebble]

I have not seen anything quite like this before in any of my own pigs - it looks like both upper and lower eyelids are inflamed/dry ("blepharitis")


Firstly, if it is an infection, you need to give the antibiotic eye drops 3 times a day for a minimum of two weeks to have a chance of eradicating it. But if, given you have been treating periodically with the same antibiotic (gentamycin) for at least a year, this would suggest that the bug causing the problem is resistant to the antibiotic and another one may need to be tried.

The first thing that comes to mind therefore, given how long this problem has been going on, is Chlamydia infection - this can be passed to baby guinea pigs from an infected mummy when they are born....and can remain as a low level infection causing the types of symptoms seen in your photo. Gentamycin does not work on Chlamydia.

The best antibiotics for Chlamydia are the tetracyclines. I do not know what types of medications are available in Italy but ideally you would be looking for your vet to prescribe a doxycycline eye drop or something like Pfizers Terramycin eye ointment - licensed for cats. (If there is no eye ointment available you could give oral doxycycline)

Your vet is right in that there are not many antibiotic eye drops/ointments that are LICENSED for guinea pigs - but it doesn;t mean that your vet can;t prescribe them. Most pharmaceutical companies will only get their medicines licensed for cats and dogs because that represents their main market share and they don;t wish to spend significantly more money getting the drugs licensed for other animal groups as the market is much lower and they will never recover the additional cost

Here in the UK most vets now prescribe many oral or topical antibioitics (including ear and eye drops) for guinea pigs that are only licensed for cats and dogs. - it;'s called prescribing "off-license" and you will be asked to sign a disclaimer.

I think I would go back to the vet and ask to try the chlamydia route first - and if it didn;t clear up after a full course of tetrcycline eye ointment woudl then look to something more mechanical such as incurling eyelashes that are causing irritation....or maybe a blocked tear duct.

PLEASE NOTE: I am talking about Chlamydophila caviae and not the Chlamydia psitacci found in birds that can also infect humans.

 

[Trikoemela]

Wow thank you very mich for your exhaustive answer! I have just had a look on the internet, there are eye ointments for cats containing tetracyclines, I am going to ask the vet if I can use one of them.
I have used gentamycin three times during the last year, everytime twice a day for only five days, should I try again for a longer period? You say the treatment should be three times a day for two weeks, that could be a reason why gentamycin did not work... Last time I used antibiotics was last summer maybe the bactetia do not remember it!

And also: I have thought it might be a blocked tear duct because it gets bettere when I massage it. But would there be a cure if it was that?

 

[7squeakers.]

Hello, Trikoemela, and to the forum! You have two VERY pretty piggies there! Sorry to hear that poor Triko has been having eye problems for so long. Hopefully, with the help from our experts on the forum, his eye will get better and stay better this time. Best of luck.