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Ring Worms
- Thread starter Louis
- Start date
Lady Kelly
Senior Guinea Pig
Ideally you need to get to a vet before next Friday. Ringworm can escalate quite quickly and is highly contagious. I'm off to the vet today for the same reason
Hi! Please see a vet sooner and do not treat on spec. Once you have treated, you are basically wiping the crime scene and making the diagnosis for a vet impossible. They will curse you for it! 
The most effective way of treating ringworm these days is by oral medication (itrafungol in the UK, sporonox in the US); the medication is prescription-only but is not yet licensed for guinea pigs although it is used by a growing number of vets and is safe to use on guinea pigs. With oral treatment, you only need to conduct one bath at the end of it to make sure that no spores are left sitting in the fur coat that could trigger a new outbreak at some point. It makes it a lot less stressful for your piggies and you, especially when the fungus is sitting close to sensitive organs, which most topical treatments do affect (swollen eyes, for instance).
Please be very careful with the hygiene since ringworm is the single most transmittable issue between all mammals, including humans. It is worth investing in a fungicidal disinfectant like F10 (which is the only one proven to kill ringwom spores). Please follow our hygiene tips.
Ringworm: Hygiene And Pictures
If your guinea pigs are new, you can reclaim any vet cost from a pet shop by presenting the vet bill together with the sales receipt if the diagnosis and treatment happens within 2 weeks of the sale as exposure and infection have happened at the shop. Afterwards the shop can claim that the infection has happened since the sale. The same goes if your vet cannot diagnose properly because of your on spec treatment before the consultation.
The most effective way of treating ringworm these days is by oral medication (itrafungol in the UK, sporonox in the US); the medication is prescription-only but is not yet licensed for guinea pigs although it is used by a growing number of vets and is safe to use on guinea pigs. With oral treatment, you only need to conduct one bath at the end of it to make sure that no spores are left sitting in the fur coat that could trigger a new outbreak at some point. It makes it a lot less stressful for your piggies and you, especially when the fungus is sitting close to sensitive organs, which most topical treatments do affect (swollen eyes, for instance).
Please be very careful with the hygiene since ringworm is the single most transmittable issue between all mammals, including humans. It is worth investing in a fungicidal disinfectant like F10 (which is the only one proven to kill ringwom spores). Please follow our hygiene tips.
Ringworm: Hygiene And Pictures
If your guinea pigs are new, you can reclaim any vet cost from a pet shop by presenting the vet bill together with the sales receipt if the diagnosis and treatment happens within 2 weeks of the sale as exposure and infection have happened at the shop. Afterwards the shop can claim that the infection has happened since the sale. The same goes if your vet cannot diagnose properly because of your on spec treatment before the consultation.
You need to get a formal diagnosis and the correct treatment from the vets sooner than Friday next week. Your piggy will be VERY uncomfortable until the correct treatment starts. You also need to be very careful not to cross contaminate.