Think McMac sprained his ankle/leg?

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LittleEskimo

LittleEskimo

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He doesn't seem to want to put pressure on his front paw and is limping. He was fine last night and have only just noticed anything. I had a look at it and it seems fine, no cuts or breaks from what I could tell...

No idea what might have done it as there is nothing in the cage that might be a hazard other then the little second level. He is starting to get on a little bit (about 3.5 years old now, middleaged) so maybe his legs aren't as good as what they used to be. He might have jumped down and not landed properly.

He is just resting in his cozycup. I might heat up a snuggle safe for him and put it underneath. Might help for the mean time.
 
There's a number of possible causes, he needs to see a vet for an examination and pain relief - the fact that he's limping (i.e. showing outward signs of pain) means that he's likely to be suffering significantly. It's well known that prey animals hide pain, but today I saw a case of the extremes that they go to in order to do this - we had a hamster in with it's leg hanging off, and it was still running around on the exposed bone, so they really can hide their pain well.

The reason it's so important to get painful conditions sorted (other than the fact that it hurts!) is because pain will often cause them to stop eating. Monitor his input and outputs until you can get to a vet to get his pain under control.
 
Amanda1801 said:
There's a number of possible causes, he needs to see a vet for an examination and pain relief - the fact that he's limping (i.e. showing outward signs of pain) means that he's likely to be suffering significantly. It's well known that prey animals hide pain, but today I saw a case of the extremes that they go to in order to do this - we had a hamster in with it's leg hanging off, and it was still running around on the exposed bone, so they really can hide their pain well.

The reason it's so important to get painful conditions sorted (other than the fact that it hurts!) is because pain will often cause them to stop eating. Monitor his input and outputs until you can get to a vet to get his pain under control.
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He is still eating and drinking and able to get to his food. I will give the vets a call but untill he gets there I am hoping a snuggle safe might help in some way.
 
I agree with Amanda. It is likely that McMac could have just sprained his ankle / leg in which it should heal by itself in a few days. Both my Erin and Ena have had sprained limbs where they just held their limbs up for a few days so they didn't have to put weight on.

Last June however, my degu Marley acted perfectly normal (eating, drinking and running around) apart from not wanting to put weight on his front leg. A trip to the vet confirmed that he had in fact broken his leg and he was prescribed metacam for the pain. It took 3 months for it to heal.
 
Dudley sprained his leg last year and the vets were really good with him. They gave him some Metacam I think and after a week he was back to his old self. He used to have a cage where he would hop in and out over the side and i guessed he caught it on that as hes getting older now so I then moved him to a C&C cage so he didnt have to hop over anything.

Kerp us updated on McMac and I hope he gets better quickly
 
I am gonna be ringing up the vets today to get him a checkup. Hopefully it isn't too major and some anti inflamitories will help. He seems a lot better with his limp today then yesterday and is willing to put weight on it when he cleans himself and stuff.
 
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