Bella's Med Thread

skuchi

Post   » Tue May 05, 2020 1:07 pm


Are these normal guinea pig noises and behaviors? After Poppy's passing 2 1/2 weeks ago my daughter is watching Bella closely. She is a little concerned about her for 3 reasons and I'm wondering if this is normal guinea pig stuff. None of these behaviors or noises are consistent or persistent.

1) Yesterday she gave Bella a bath and afterward my daughter said she could hear a bit of a 'sticky' quality a couple of times when she was wheeking for food afterward. She described it as being like when you have a congested nose and sometimes a few breaths have a sticky, cruddy sound to it as that breaks loose. A little stick and then release of air. It happened a couple of times after the bath, but not before. It does not sound like the popping or crackling of respiratory infection, is not consistent, and only happened a couple of times last night. The only time it happened this morning was once when she got picked up initially and huffed. There is no abnormal noise when she's sniffing things. She's not being very cooperative in the wheeking department today so we haven't been able to evaluate that. We are wondering if she got a bit of bath water up her nose.

2) Her other concern is that Bella has started huffing and puffing when she gets her out of the cage. The noise sounds akin to someone who's a little winded by exercise and is breathing a bit harder/faster than usual. It stops pretty quickly (a minute or so at most), is not consistent, and seems to mostly/only occur when my daughter gets her out of the cage. She doesn't seem to be doing it while she's just sitting around, only when she's annoyed.

3) Bella also has a little, tiny wheek that accompanies or comes after these behaviors at times. It's not a very vocal noise. If I had to equate the volume to a human noise it would be like someone with their mouth closed making a short, light 'hmm' or something like that rather than a full mouth-open vocalization. Other than that it sounds like a normal wheek, just very short and light.

Poppy had a respiratory infection when she passed and my daughter is afraid Bella will pick it up. We have read that's not likely, and it's been 2 1/2 weeks. She's not hunched up or showing other signs of pain. No weight loss. Is eating normally and otherwise acting normally. No other signs of illness. She does have cysts we've been managing for almost a year-- 4 months with Lupron, and the last 7 months with HCL. She had her last HCL shot 1 week ago.

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Tue May 05, 2020 3:39 pm


I do not know if these small things you noticed are significant or not - but any time you suspect there might be a health issue (especially respiratory), you can start weighing once or twice a day as an added flag in case there is something wrong. Perhaps you are already weighing daily?
https://www.guinealynx.info/weigh.html

You could also read over:
https://www.guinealynx.info/heart.html

I expect the issue you think could have been caused by a bit of inhaled water will go away if that is all it is.

You will likely get some good advice from other members.

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ItsaZoo
Supporter in 2023

Post   » Tue May 05, 2020 4:59 pm


As Bpatters said, weigh her and keep an eye on her. Contact a vet when in doubt.

I have not given my guinea pig a full bath, but any partial cleaning I do gets her stressed. She really doesn’t like water. And when she’s scared or stressed, she breaths fast huffing like she just ran a marathon, and whimpering like she’s complaining.

skuchi

Post   » Tue May 05, 2020 7:27 pm


Thanks, Lynx and ItsaZoo. We do weigh her daily. :) We started about a year ago when the cystic ovaries began, she's getting on in years so we watch her pretty closely.
I think it's likely that her current issues are a temporary problem resulting from her bath. If it doesn't resolve very soon or seems to change/get worse she will definitely go see the vet. She was just there a week ago for shots and a check-up. As nice as the vet is, I don't think Bella will be thrilled to go again. lol The huffing seems like an annoyed pig, she does it in response to my daughter picking her up and it stops soon after. I think she's irritated with all the extra, well-intentioned attention.

skuchi

Post   » Mon Nov 23, 2020 2:52 pm


Bella, our senior girl, has been getting stiff in her old age and last week we took her to the vet because she's been moving less and started chattering her teeth, which worried us about pain. The vet put her on Metacam, 1.5mg/ml solution, .5cc twice per day. She's been on it for five days now and is moving better, is back to being talkative, and even given us a few old-pig popcorns (more of a head twitch at this age :)). All of which are improvements, so she's obviously feeling better. She weighs about 630grams at the moment and is also on two shots of HCG about every 60 days for ovarian cysts.

Our concern is that she seems to be sleeping wedged into places (is this a sign of pain still?) and doesn't seem to be drinking quite as much (we just started marking her water bottle to see how much she takes daily). We've started giving her more 'wet' veggies like lettuce, cucumbers, peppers (and making sure the lettuce is washed but not dried). Anything else we can do or need to watch for?

I know Metacam can exacerbate kidney issues so that's what worries me about not drinking. The vet also wants her to take omega 3's but said it can upset their stomachs, so we are trying to get the Metacam sorted out first and then slowly add the other.

bpatters
And got the T-shirt

Post   » Mon Nov 23, 2020 3:29 pm


You can syringe fluids to her. She may not want plain water, but lightly flavored with something she likes may tempt her. And most pigs love Pedialyte.

JJGiebz
Make Good Choices

Post   » Tue Nov 24, 2020 8:49 pm


I trick mine with a teeny bit of carrot juice mixed in the water. About 1ml of carrot juice to 40 or 50 ml of water and I offer it to him via syringe throughout the day.

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Sef
I dissent.

Post   » Tue Nov 24, 2020 9:36 pm


Unflavored Pedialyte is another good option. It helped give quality of life to more than one of our 'renal' pigs over the years.

skuchi

Post   » Wed Dec 02, 2020 10:22 am


Thanks everybody. :) How much Pedialyte should we give her and how often?

My daughter says she is giving her .2 ml of unflavored Pedialyte each evening, wetting her veggies and adding extra watery ones (cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, peppers and an occasional grape/orange/etc). Bella's poops have rounded out and become normal over the course of the last few days (they were a bit pointed). Bella also drinks about 20 mil of water per day on her own (been measuring the water bottle).

Last night, as she was taking care of Bella's skin, my daughter also noticed some orange'ish spots, not a full urine puddle, on the rag after 20 minutes. It smelled like strong urine, so assuming it was. Is this the Metacam? Dehydration indicator? We'll put her on a pee pad today so we can see it more clearly (she's on brown bedding).

**Extra info: She weighs approx 610grams (down from 630 3 weeks ago). She is getting HCG shots every two months, and currently needs another (she's getting bald spots on her abdomen again). We gave her a very low dose of the Omega 3's last week and within 2 days she was eating less, wasn't drinking much, and just not acting herself, so we stopped. Her appetite is back and she's behaving normally now.

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Wed Dec 02, 2020 8:04 pm


The orange urine may be normal. Sometimes porphyrins will color the urine orange.
https://www.guinealynx.info/normal.html#urine

I don't know exactly what would cause the odor. I do know bacteria can cause it though (when giving an antibiotic, there is usually no odor present as it kills the bacteria that generates the odor).

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ItsaZoo
Supporter in 2023

Post   » Wed Dec 02, 2020 11:23 pm


I notice orange urine when I feed a little dandelion or celery tops. I think the higher calcium foods can cause it.

skuchi

Post   » Thu Dec 03, 2020 6:50 pm


Thank you, Itsazoo and Lynx. She has had quite a bit of celery lately. :) And we took her out on a white pad and she seems to be fine, no odd odor or color.

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