Vet stumped

[doubtful101]

I have a female guinea pig, 4 years old, who has stopped eating hay. She was losing weight, lethargic, but I didn’t notice her not eating because she is still attacking the hay, but she’s just sort of mouthing it.

I thought it was a bad cutting, but then when I gave her her favorite cookie (oxbow vitamin c tablet), she mouthed it, pawed it, gnawed it, shook it, repositioned it x20 but could not seem to eat it. So then I started thinking dental issue. I soaked it in water, and she scarfed it down, so I was pretty sure that was it.

I put her on critical care, and took her to a guinea pig specialist, and…. Perfect teeth. Vet got a fantastic look at them and said they were in great condition. She couldn’t feel any pain or lumps, she didn’t see her favoring a side of her mouth, didn’t see any evidence of anything wrong. Except the fact that it took her like a whole minute to chew a pea flake. She stuck her scope in her mouth multiple times to try and see anything while she was eating, but nothing.

She called her a mystery snd said she was stumped.

She is eating critical care on her own, so the next steps with the vet are seeing if it improves in a few weeks, and if not, anesthesia and endoscope. The vet says she doesn’t think she will find anything because her teeth are in such good shape due to her hay diet, but there’s not much else she’d recommend. She says it’s hard to see anything in a guinea pig skull and neck on an X-ray, and CT scans where I am are $800 and the vet isn’t confident that’s a good idea either. If the endoscope doesn’t give us any answers then it’s antibiotics for an unknown possible infection.

I have a few sources of hay, and she won’t touch any of them.

I’m a little worried with her now being on an indefinite critical care diet. It’s been about a week or so of her not eating solid food, with her immaculate teeth. Does anyone have any similar experiences?

 

[CTWC]

Hi there I'm not one of the experts but just wanted to offer my support and reassurance that someone will be along soon it's 4 am here so most of the knowledgeable people will be in bed. Please switch to weighing your girl every morning to assess how much food she is eating and therefore how much critical care she needs each day

 

[sport_billy]

That honestly sounds like teeth issues to me. It could be issues with the roots possibly.
I am presuming you are stateside, I would recommend finding a cavy savy vet Guinea Lynx :: GL's Vet List Guinea lynx is mainly US based medical website so worth joining their health focussed forum also Guinea Lynx Forums - Forum Home

 

[doubtful101]

That honestly sounds like teeth issues to me. It could be issues with the roots possibly.
I am presuming you are stateside, I would recommend finding a cavy savy vet Guinea Lynx :: GL's Vet List Guinea lynx is mainly US based medical website so worth joining their health focussed forum also Guinea Lynx Forums - Forum Home

She’s seeing a guinea pig specialist! I have to drive about an hour to her, but she’s great. So if she’s stumped I trust it

 

[Piggies&buns]

The symptoms you describe do sound dental to me too.
How long has the issue been going on?
I’m just wondering whether it is dental but not yet big and obvious enough to see - something very small can make a big difference to their ability to eat. Without chewing any hay obviously any dental issue will get worse eventually.
It’s great you’re seeing a piggy specialist vet - does that definitely include dental knowledge?
I ask this as even exotic vets aren’t given much in the way of piggy dental training (you may notice from other threads that we regularly mention just one particular vet practice in the whole of the uk as being recommended dental specialists).

We can only ever make guesses as owners. If everything to do with the mouth, including things such as oral thrush, have also been completely ruled out all, then all you can do is be guided by your vet in next steps.

 

[doubtful101]

It’s been about a week since this started. My feelings are that whatever it is, it’s severe enough that she won’t eat solid food, and she’s usually the piggy that might gobble your finger in her rush to scarf down any food in front of her face.

My vet is the one the biggest guinea pig rescue in the area uses, she’s considered to be very good, and all the times I’ve taken my guinea pigs in to her she’s done a fantastic job. She even did my boy’s neuter. She does do filing, I’m not sure if it’s under partial or full anaesthesia. I’m in the state of Washington in the US.

The clinic she’s at doesn’t do dental surgery however, and according to her, the only place she’d feel good about sending me to do a potential tooth extraction, if that’s what you mean, is a place in Canada. There is only one other exotics vet nearby to me that sees guinea pigs, and they pretty egregiously misdiagnosed one of my pigs once and advised I put her down when she was healthy! So I am very sensitive to unknowledgeable vets.

I’m just looking to get more informed about the whole process, and seeing if anyone had any suggestions or similar experience with these symptoms. My vet flushed out my piggy’s mouth, and spent quite a bit of time with the endoscope. Due to my guinea pig only being on hay I believe her when she says she has great teeth and didn’t see any edges, ulcers, or irritation.

I want to know what kind of root issues, or other illnesses, could possibly be behind something like this. If anyone has any experience? What sort of invisible dental issues are there? Maybe someone would have a similar experience to mine, and I’d recognize some symptoms my girl is having, and be able to talk to my vet about it.

As much as I am willing to give my vet free rein, I also know that vets have to go down the list of most to least likely, and in the past I have directed them to skip protocol if I think something else is likely. I.E I know one of mine is prone to UTI’s, and if I see the signs I will skip the xray they recommend and go for antibiotics. In this case if someone had a similar experience and reason to go for the CT scan, I might pull the trigger, instead of waiting a few weeks for any changes like my vet currently recommends.

Just fishing for thoughts

 

[doubtful101]

Wanted to write an update - that piggy has started eating hay again, so I have weaned down on critical care. She still isn’t able to eat her hard oxbow tablets but her behavior is normal. My vet said it may have been something small that she wasn’t able to see.

 

[Piggies&buns]

I’m glad she has started eating again.

 

[Dwarfpotato]

I have had something similar. We called it the mouth flaps. Tico would suddenly go off her food and refuse to eat anything, even pea flakes. It was so sad to see - she wanted to eat, would sniff the food, and then make a sad face and back off. At the start of a bout/flare up she would pick up food and try to chew it, then spit it out and make faces like something was stuck (hence the mouth flaps - it resulted in lots of ear flapping too), paw at her mouth, sticking her tongue out etc. Does that sound like what you're seeing?

One other symptom was what my partner called "the sad floomps". She'd be feeling confident about food and try to pick at some hay or a pea flake, find she couldn't bear to eat it and go lay in a bed and look sad.

It happened several times over the years - she'd completely stop eating, but when I offered her goop (science selective was her favourite, I think because it was my least favourite) she was ravenous and would eat loads. Refuse it off a spoon or out of a bowl, devour it from a syringe. It would normally take her a few days of not eating at all and then she'd slowly start picking at food again. I could then wean her off goop and she'd go back to eating normally again.

I took her to the UK pig dental specialist and he agreed that her teeth looked perfect. His best guess was thrush and she had some itrafungol but she had another bout of it after so it didn't seem to fix it. Sometimes metacam seemed to make it heal faster but not enough data points to confirm.

Our best guess was that she was basically biting her cheek? And that was making it uncomfortable to eat and like she had something stuck in her mouth. I'm sorry to say we never actually got to the bottom of it! I just dealt with it by keeping a stock of recovery food in so we could deal with it whenever it happened.

It often seemed to start when she had something like a hay cube in the cage, but we stopped giving her those and she still had one or two cases of it so we can't be sure.

The only other common theme when it happened was it always seemed to be at the start of a weekend or a holiday, and we can't help but think she wanted some extra attention while I was home.......

 

[doubtful101]

I have had something similar. We called it the mouth flaps. Tico would suddenly go off her food and refuse to eat anything, even pea flakes. It was so sad to see - she wanted to eat, would sniff the food, and then make a sad face and back off. At the start of a bout/flare up she would pick up food and try to chew it, then spit it out and make faces like something was stuck (hence the mouth flaps - it resulted in lots of ear flapping too), paw at her mouth, sticking her tongue out etc. Does that sound like what you're seeing?

One other symptom was what my partner called "the sad floomps". She'd be feeling confident about food and try to pick at some hay or a pea flake, find she couldn't bear to eat it and go lay in a bed and look sad.

It happened several times over the years - she'd completely stop eating, but when I offered her goop (science selective was her favourite, I think because it was my least favourite) she was ravenous and would eat loads. Refuse it off a spoon or out of a bowl, devour it from a syringe. It would normally take her a few days of not eating at all and then she'd slowly start picking at food again. I could then wean her off goop and she'd go back to eating normally again.

I took her to the UK pig dental specialist and he agreed that her teeth looked perfect. His best guess was thrush and she had some itrafungol but she had another bout of it after so it didn't seem to fix it. Sometimes metacam seemed to make it heal faster but not enough data points to confirm.

Our best guess was that she was basically biting her cheek? And that was making it uncomfortable to eat and like she had something stuck in her mouth. I'm sorry to say we never actually got to the bottom of it! I just dealt with it by keeping a stock of recovery food in so we could deal with it whenever it happened.

It often seemed to start when she had something like a hay cube in the cage, but we stopped giving her those and she still had one or two cases of it so we can't be sure.

The only other common theme when it happened was it always seemed to be at the start of a weekend or a holiday, and we can't help but think she wanted some extra attention while I was home.......

Absolutely, my pig was acting the same! Wanted to eat, would try, but couldn’t do it and would go lay down and look sad. She couldn’t eat any hard food including pea flakes, would only scarf down gloop. She vibrated when I touched her face once, like it was painful, but the vet didn’t palpate pain.

She is back to her original weight, weaned off of critical care, eating hay, and starting to do better at eating the oxbow tablets again. She was off food for about a week. It’s such a relief to see her back to normal again but so perplexing to not have an answer.

She was on meloxicam for about a week. She absolutely adored it, sucked it straight out of the syringe, but it didn’t seem to have any effect on her eating/pain. I even gave her some of my other guinea pig’s hardcore pain meds, but she just sort of got zooted, and still didn’t eat. Maybe because the effort and/or pain involved in eating hay wasn’t worth it when critical care is so yummy.

I’m just gonna keep the critical care stocked in the freezer if it happens again.

Maybe just a toothache the world may never know

 

[GWWTPig]

Absolutely, my pig was acting the same! Wanted to eat, would try, but couldn’t do it and would go lay down and look sad. She couldn’t eat any hard food including pea flakes, would only scarf down gloop. She vibrated when I touched her face once, like it was painful, but the vet didn’t palpate pain.

She is back to her original weight, weaned off of critical care, eating hay, and starting to do better at eating the oxbow tablets again. She was off food for about a week. It’s such a relief to see her back to normal again but so perplexing to not have an answer.

She was on meloxicam for about a week. She absolutely adored it, sucked it straight out of the syringe, but it didn’t seem to have any effect on her eating/pain. I even gave her some of my other guinea pig’s hardcore pain meds, but she just sort of got zooted, and still didn’t eat. Maybe because the effort and/or pain involved in eating hay wasn’t worth it when critical care is so yummy.

I’m just gonna keep the critical care stocked in the freezer if it happens again.

Maybe just a toothache the world may never know

What other pain meds did you happen to give your piggy. Mine is currently on Metcam (.5ml) daily but it doesn't seem like it's doing much. Your situation appears to be similar to what I am going through at the moment with one of my boys. Though this has been going on for about 3 weeks now. He seems to eat his hay for a little bit just fine, but decides to go hide in his house not shortly after. You can hear him grind his teeth, so obviously he is in pain. The Vet that I go to said that his teeth looked fine and didn't require any trimming. X-rays didn't appear to show anything either. No abscesses and or cuts. Have him on antibiotics along with vitamin c supplement just to rule out scurvy, but my gut is telling me teeth. Should mention that he won't eat pellets. Loves his pea flakes though

I have had other piggies in the past with overgrown molars and the symptoms arent 100% the same. Same Vet did those trimmings so I would assume that they would know what they are looking at.

 

[Dwarfpotato]

What other pain meds did you happen to give your piggy. Mine is currently on Metcam (.5ml) daily but it doesn't seem like it's doing much. Your situation appears to be similar to what I am going through at the moment with one of my boys. Though this has been going on for about 3 weeks now. He seems to eat his hay for a little bit just fine, but decides to go hide in his house not shortly after. You can hear him grind his teeth, so obviously he is in pain. The Vet that I go to said that his teeth looked fine and didn't require any trimming. X-rays didn't appear to show anything either. No abscesses and or cuts. Have him on antibiotics along with vitamin c supplement just to rule out scurvy, but my gut is telling me teeth. Should mention that he won't eat pellets. Loves his pea flakes though

I have had other piggies in the past with overgrown molars and the symptoms arent 100% the same. Same Vet did those trimmings so I would assume that they would know what they are looking at.

Tico just had metacam but I was never sure if it helped. Her bouts only ever lasted up to five days or so though, and then she'd be fine for months.

I never experienced my pigs grinding their teeth but she used to chatter at me regularly as an alternative way of telling me to hurry up. I don't remember if she'd do that when she had the mouth flaps though.

She would also eat absolutely nothing, not even pea flakes. Pellets were one of the first things to come back, I think because she could suck on them for a bit until they went soft.

I hope you get to the bottom of this.