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Dental Struggling to eat before and after dental work

Aw, that’s great news x Hope this will be the start now and he gets eating again properly x
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
Great news! Keep going with the meds, they seem to be working!
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We will keep on with meds, and the syringe feeding, for now ; though we've reduced the quantity that we are syringing because he is clearly eating some food on his own, and he soon lets us know when he's had enough anyway!
 
We had our follow-up appt at Colne Valley Vets today : the vet (Clare) was happy that Jake was now eating something (grass ; muesli ; small pieces of apple and pepper) but was not at all convinced that he had/has thrush, or that the problem is solved.
We discussed possible anti-biotics, as suggested by Simon, for if there is no further improvement in the next week or so, and she says there is only one that is ever effective with abscesses in a guinea-pig, and that is not Baytril, the 'standard' antibiotic in animals of this type.
We have therefore booked a further appointment for 8 days' time to see how he is, and take it from there ; in the meantime, we need to continue with the syringe feeding, even though Jake now clearly thinks it is unnecessary!
 
There are a few antibiotics that are good with abscesses. Zithromax (azithromycin) is very good and we have sometimes used that in conjunction with Marbocyl, for stubborn abscesses. We have also used a combination of Marbocyl and Metronidazole too. All have had really good results.
 
No change : and we're pretty depressed about it.
We thought when he started nibbling lettuce and then grass last Sunday, that within a few days more he would be eating everything. But he has simply plateaued : he can bite just about anything, but chewing it takes forever ; and still no attempt to eat hay or pellets.
So we're now into a 3rd week of 5 times a day syringe feeding, and getting pretty deflated about it all.
If anyone has any further ideas, please share : we're starting to assume that he has something 'bad' going on metabolically which is preventing him being able to chew ; and maybe he had a minor problem on top which the medication has improved, possibly only temporarily.
 
This can sometimes happen and it doesn't mean that it is going to be a bad outcome. It can sometimes be small steps, but as long as they are going in the right direction then there is a lot to smile about The fact he has plateaued and not gone backwards is a good sign. Are you going back to Simon? I think you should as he will be able to see how the teeth are wearing and it may have become more obvious what the problem is with the molars. What medication is he currently taking?
 
My last conversation with Simon, on the phone, entailed him basically saying he was pretty much out of ideas, but was pretty certain that his teeth were not in themselves the issue. Currently Jake is still on the Loxicam and itraFungol, until Wednesday. We are back to the vets in Colchester then with possibly a view to trying anti-biotics in case there is some unseen infection / abscess, as recommended by Simon in that last phone call.
 
Can’t add any further advice just want to offer support, hope you find out what Jake’s problem is and get him sorted x
 
Sending lots of healing thoughts for Jake. It took Barbara 3 months to recover so don't give up hope. She had Marbocyl and Metronidazole- a potent mix, plus the Itrafungol.
 
Mackers said:
Sending lots of healing thoughts for Jake. It took Barbara 3 months to recover so don't give up hope. She had Marbocyl and Metronidazole- a potent mix, plus the Itrafungol.
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We are currently giving that combination to Tilly and I feel we are starting to get on top of the abscess at last.
 
Unfortunately I don't think he's going to make that Wednesday appointment : he's now reverted to only eating what we can syringe into him ; after a whole week of eagerly taking lettuce, apple, pepper etc, he's now back to not even opening his mouth when anything is presented to him. We've been doing very well with the syringe feeding the last 3 days, and he's put on over 50g, but tonight he's listless and uninterested, and is not even standing upright for any significant period of time. I think we're losing him. Just very upset.
 
cwlight said:
Hi, this is my first post.
We have 4 guinea-pigs, and 1 of them, Jake, has recently lost a lot of weight. He was always the smallest, round about 1 kg, but had gone down to 650g a few weeks back, and was always at the drink bottle, at which point the vet checked for diabetes (borderline), did a general check, and said they could find nothing else wrong. We restricted sugary foods in their diet, and he then started putting weight back on, without any treatment, and at end of May was back up to around 850g : however, even while regaining weight, he seemed to take a long time to eat each food item compared to the others. His drinking had decreased but was still more than the others.
We then went away for a week, leaving them all in the care of neighbours who followed the usual food regime, but when we got back it was clear that he had lost weight again, and now was struggling to eat anything : he wouldn't even try to eat hay, and while eager to have his veggies (Romaine lettuce ; spinach ; occasional piece of pepper) he then took ages to eat each portion ; he was not eating nuggets but DID seem to manage a few pieces of muesli type food, which obviously we don't usually give them (we had a bag passed on by someone else).
I took him to the vet, again, (Tuesday 11th June) who this time said his incisors were fine but his molars were overgrown and we needed to book him in for a dental ; this we did, and he was away all day yesterday (Wed 12th June). When we got him back, the vet nurse said they had burred his molars AND trimmed his incisors, BUT the vet who did the job reported back than neither was actually bad enough to be causing the problem, in her opinion! (despite them suggesting and carrying out a procedure they felt not really necessary, they happily billed us £228 for the privilege, which I feel is very steep,, but that's another story.)
Today, nothing has changed : he won't eat anything other than the unhealthy muesli, and that in small quantities ; he was out on the grass today with his peers and desperately trying to nibble grass etc like they were but then giving up.
We then set him up a cage to himself to monitor what he has eaten, and it has been a few muesli pieces and nothing else. He is still very perky and bright, and enthusiastically takes all his favourite veggies from you (parsley ; carrot ; spinach) but then gives up and leaves it. When I hand-fed him a tiny piece of carrot, he tried to bite it but didn't even make an indentation. He won't even try normal nuggets or hay. I put a couple of dandelions in the cage and he desperately tried to chew one of the flowers off, but failed.
He has lost another 50g in weight.
Help, please!
I have made up some mushy pellet 'soup' as per instructions on this site, and have managed to get 5ml into him so far but despair on managing 120ml in a day.
He is back to the vet on Saturday morning, but I have no faith in them being any help : the vets are all very young women (all the senior partners retired simultaneously a couple of years ago) and frankly I'm not convinced they know what they're doing with a guinea-pig.
I am in Ipswich, Suffolk.
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HI keep on syringe feeding.
 
Oh, I’m so sorry to hear this, hope your poor boy Jake pulls through, I really don’t know what to suggest apart from keeping him going with syringe food, so sorry for you x
 
Off to the vet this morning : hoping she will prescribe the Marbocyl.
 
I managed to persuade the vet in Colchester to prescribe Marbocyl, as recommended by people on here : she said the only antibiotic actually licensed for guinea-pigs is Baytril, but I said that since we were already into 'hit and hope' territory, where there is no obvious infection but everything else we've tried hasn't worked, please could we go with the stronger alternative ; and she agreed. We have to give Jake half a 5mg tablet per day for a week and then go back to her for assessment. Now it's just a case of how to get that half-tablet into him! (via his syringe food I'm thinking).
What we didn't tell the vet was that we had already been giving Jake Baytril (my wife had some in stock from her hedgehog rescue work) since Monday morning, because the crisis of Sunday night appeared to be chest / breathing related, with him listless and wheezing, and a couple of coughs. That in itself had improved him again, but only to where he was last week, not to the point of eating 'normal' food again.
 
Aw, well let’s hope the new antibiotics works for him. Wonder if you can soak the dose in a tiny bit of water and then mix with a little Critical Care and syringe just before his meal. Really hopes this sorts out any infection there may be lurking somewhere, poor little chap x
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
That’s a low dose. We give 1 tablet per day. I break the tablet in half, as half a tablet fits into the end of a syringe. I draw up a syringe of food and push tablet into end of syringe. Then it’s easy to syringe food plus tablet into piggies mouth.
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The dosage I found online was 4 mg per 1 kg, so as he is only 750g (though that's up from 687g last week), I'm guessing the vet thought the closest to the correct dose (3mg) would be half a tablet (2.5mg) rather than a whole one (5mg). She believes it's not going to work anyway : let's hope she's wrong!
Good idea on the syringing though : thanks.
 
Oh poor Jake, sending hugs your way! We also used 1 tablet per day when Tonks had a raging infection, it worked a treat. I did as advised above by furryfriends (TEAS).

It may be worth asking Simon for advice, I know he was amazing when Tonks was poorly with giving us the correct medication and dosage, without his advice over email I doubt Tonks would still be here to scream for food today!

I also hope she’s wrong, I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed for you both x
 
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