Older rabbit with possible gi-stasis?

[Kaninmor]

Hello! I'm new here and have a medical related question.
Those of you who have experience with older rabbits and gi-stasis. What sort of time frame are we looking at in terms of recovery? Our 9 year old lop has been very poorly for 3 days now. We love him and we want to give him a chance to recover, but at the same time we don't want him to suffer indefinitely, just because we can't let go.


We have taken him to the vet and the rabbit specialist was very concerned that he has lost a lot of weight since he last was there, in april. He's lost 500 grams, which for him at 2 kg is 20% weightloss. They checked his teeth, took an mr, they didn't find anything wrong other than dehydration, he had an empty stomach (not blocked). He's just not eating and they couldn't get enough blood to run a diagnosis/test, so there wasn't much they could do, she said. She was concerned it was his kidneys or liver which would have shown on the blood control. They kept him for the day and gave him fluid and cc. For some reason she didn't mention gi-stasis which I personally find most likely after reading about it.



We picked him up after a whole day at the vet's, he was very apathetic, we gave him critical care porridge, and the day after he seemed a bit more alert, he sort of accepted the porridge and tried to eat a bit himself. At one point (yesterday) when I went to have a look, he was visibly more alert. He was sitting normally upright, not hunched over as the day before and seemed to be chewing on something (either hay or poop I guess, both would be a good sign) and he seemed to be trying to clean himself. I gave him a dandelion leaf which he grumpily accepted and started eating. Which felt like a huge step in the right direction. He still has very soft stools so if you have any tips to share for cleaning a soiled and furry bottom, please tell me. I've tried to just use a wet towel, but it's difficult with all the (white) fur.



We've continued feeding him cc porridge and I've gotten him to drink a few sips of water after every feeding as well. He also eats a little bit of dandelion leaf when offered. I opened their pen to let his partner out and then he came out too. He was visibly weak though and looks very tired.



I wonder if this whole predicament and the weight loss started when it was unusually warm here in june. I noticed they didn't seem to have much appetite for anything other than greens and maybe he just never got back to eating enough pellets/hay. Then he got soft stools (I suspect it is my fault, I gave them a bit of banana as a treat and while he's tolerated it well before, he's getting older and often seems to react to food he could eat without problems before, his partner was/is fine) so I stopped giving them anything but hay for a few days and perhaps he just didn't eat that either, he was very unhappy about only getting hay, but instead of getting better he got worse



In any case, there seems to be some development in the right direction. Of course he is getting older too, I've noticed (over time) that he is not as strong and steady as he used to be, but he has been acting quite sprightly lately (until the last few days) so we're clinging onto the hope that he just needs some time.

If anyone has experience with this, I'd very much appreciate any advice you can come with.

 

[zuppa]

Hi, welcome to the forum! I have no experience with seniors unfortunately can't advise but have experience with GI stasis. My rabbit needed about two weeks to recover and he also had lost some weight and I was increasing his pellets slowly over a couple weeks too. He was 2 year old then.
If your rabbit lives with his partner you might want to feed them separately so you can control better how much and what he is eating.
10 years is good age, maybe it would be better to transfer him gradually to senior pellets?

We have some people here with experience with senior rabbits I know for sure @Nancy McClelland and I hope @JBun will see your thread as well.

For the dirty bottom, how bad is that, can you post some pictures? Wet towel or baby wipes should work, what kind of soft poos, maybe it's underdeveloped cecotropes, are they large and stinky like zeppelins? We love photo in this forum because description is often not enough, please feel free to post some photo of his poos as well, those soft ones and also if he has his normal poos.

Hope he gets's well soon, please keep us updated

 

[Kaninmor]

Thank you so much! I'll try to take photos of his bum next time I feed him cc, the soft stools have been an ongoing problem for maybe 10 days? His bum is really soiled and I feel terrible that I haven't been able to take better care of that At first I thought it was a reaction to something he should not have had (that banana), which it probably was, I just assumed it would go over with a few days with just hay. I'm not sure what zeppelins are, but the poop is smelly and sticks to his fur, but I suspect he might also just be peeing right where he is, rather than going to the toilet. Adding to the odour.
My husband is going to the vet's for more cc, he's also going to ask if they have something for his pain/gas as well. We didn't get any the other day.

I'm so glad to hear your bunny recovered!
Can I ask you how his behaviour was during the recovery? Did it take many days for him to get visibly better? We feel like we see glimpses where he seems to be somewhat better and then he's just back to lying curled up in his corner

 

[zuppa]

Thank you so much! I'll try to take photos of his bum next time I feed him cc, the soft stools have been an ongoing problem for maybe 10 days? His bum is really soiled and I feel terrible that I haven't been able to take better care of that At first I thought it was a reaction to something he should not have had (that banana), which it probably was, I just assumed it would go over with a few days with just hay. I'm not sure what zeppelins are, but the poop is smelly and sticks to his fur, but I suspect he might also just be peeing right where he is, rather than going to the toilet. Adding to the odour.
My husband is going to the vet's for more cc, he's also going to ask if they have something for his pain/gas as well. We didn't get any the other day.

I'm so glad to hear your bunny recovered!
Can I ask you how his behaviour was during the recovery? Did it take many days for him to get visibly better? We feel like we see glimpses where he seems to be somewhat better and then he's just back to lying curled up in his corner

I had two rabbits with GI stasis/bloating, first had overgrown teeth and I never had experience with it previously so never really checked teeth properly. When I noticed he's not eating properly it was too late, we trimmed them a few times they were growing really fast since bottom teeth were not in use at all so he'd only can eat pellets I hand fed him putting one at a time to his mouth from one side. But was too late.
He was hiding pellets under his bed for over a week so I thought he is eating normally, I've checked when I found dried vegs when was cleaning his toilet he left a piece of carrot and a few lettuce leaves that was unusual, but he was scheduled for neutering and he was spraying all around so he was kind of isolated a bit for more than one week, he spent days in his 100x50cm cage and it was covered from 3 sides since he kept spraying walls and everything around, so he was only out for an hour a day and he peed / pooed all over the place and sprayed on everybody. I was really angry with him since he behaved badly.

He was also shedding heavily and he was a very tidy little rabbit he cleaned himself very well all the time so he was unable to eat hay on his own and he had much hair in his stomach, that's why he's got a blockage.

I regret I didn't see earlier he probably was depressed because he was a very sweet and loving little rabbit, he was a dwarf. And I was avoiding him because every time I held him he peed all over me he just wanted to mark me as his property but I didn't like it. He was leaving piles of poo all over me and all around as well.

This is very hard memories and was completely my fault if it was now I could manage it, I check teeth now at least once a weeks and pay more attention when it is molting time.

He was only one year old and when he's got a blockage he was gone very quickly.

With other rabbit Peter it was all success. He was nearly 2 year old and I adopted him in December from an online advert people were selling him with his cage all with accessories for the half price of the cage alone, I didn't want him to go to somebody who just want to get a good cage for cheap and would just dump him, so I paid and they delivered.

When I saw him he was very fat, he was so fat she opened the carrier and he was wall to wall, hardly fit in there. He didn't look like his photos but his owner never told me he's unwell or if there's anything wrong with him so I thought he's just one fat bunny. I was going to leave him alone for first 24 hours but he was generally quite nice and liked to be held, wasn't scared so I brushed his coat and found that he's not fat actually I can feel his bones and spine but his belly is bloating.
I was horrified and also I was lucky that I saw that almost immediately and not after a couple of days as I planned to leave him alone for 48h first. Also I was horrified that people didn't tell me that, it was just like dumping their sick rabbit because of his problems, his poos vere very tiny and only a few, and he also produced those large stinky submarines I call them stinky zeppelins so they were sticky and his bum wasn#t clean and all.

Honestly I thought he won't make it. I had a few quiet minutes then I did a massive research and also asked here I actually posted everything I found on that thread, if you have time you can see that threat here

>>New rabbit fat and tiny poos

His problem was his food, he was on grain and muesli type food, also got snacks every day they were dairy and grain balls and grainy honey sticks, he loved them but they were bad for his stomach. Also because he had so much rich food he didn't want to eat hay at all, so it all led to blockages and bloating.

It was in December and he recovered completely and never had any problems with his poos since then, those stinky large poos were his underdeveloped cecotropes (cecal dysbiosis) caused by his wrong diet. They can also indicate some more serious problems, like liver problems etc, but in his case they're gone completely and his poos are excellent now. He eats lots of hay now.

First 5-7 days he was pretty bad, I counted his small misshaped poos he had literally 8-10 poos per day. I wasn't too sure he will survive. So after one week or 10 days his poos were little better and he started eating on his own, then probably 2-3 weeks and he was getting better and he also lost some weight especially when I saw him first time he was so fat, now he was a bit underweight. So took about one month or a bit more for full recovery. And he is an extremely tidy rabbit I have to say, he is still not neutered but uses his toilet precisely and cleans himself really well. He is also a very sweet rabbit, since I was holding him a lot when he was unwell and all the belly massages and all, brushing etc, so he is very attached to me and demands every evening that I have to hold him for at least half an hour he is very sweet. He is getting neutered very soon and then after a couple months I will be bonding him so he can have a friend so they could groom each other, he's very friendly.

By the way, here's a video for belly massage it is really very helpful might be useful to you too

 

[Kaninmor]

Thank you so much for your kind answer. I´m also in a local FB group, but I sometimes find it hard to ask there, some people get judgmental really fast. I read your other post, and I´m so glad that your rabbit Peter survived, it´s horrible when they get sick. It feels like you´re doing everything blindfolded, you can´t ask them and you have to base everything on their body language. And sometimes you make mistakes and that can be heartbreaking. It looks very much like what is troubling my rabbit, I´ll try to massage his tummy even more (I´ve done some).

I have now separated my rabbits, I found a big old cage that I´ve put my sick rabbit in, so I can monitor what he eats/poops more easily. Also to lessen the stress on both of my rabbits. The other bun is just in their pen/out and about as usual. Then I called the vet and she prescribed some pain medication (metacam) for gas pain. It´s very tasty, or at least I imagine so, it smells sweet like honey and my rabbit got very eager when I offered him this! So now he´s had cc and his first dose of pain killer and is just resting in his cage. I hope that he´ll eat better once he´s in less pain. He´s been good at drinking water too. So hopefully he´ll start recovering soon.

I know what you mean about regrets, my first rabbit had a really unhealthy diet and teeth problems as well. At that time it was also difficult to get proper rabbit help, most vets seemed to specialise in cats and dogs and I would take him to the vet, only to be told "I don´t really know anything about rabbits" and here´s the card machine... Fortunately that has changed a lot, there seems to have been an "awakening" when it comes to rabbits as pets here in Norway, now it´s (relatively) easy to find someone who specialises in rabbits and information about keeping rabbits is readily available all over. It was very different when I had my first rabbit. We had to put him to sleep when he was 9 years and it was really hard, especially because I felt like I had failed him utterly; not giving him better diet, not getting a friend for him, not finding a proper vet and so on. My present rabbits have a much better life, they have each other, they´ve generally had better diet and so on. Although, they probably have had too many treats at times... So, in an odd way, I think that knowing he had a happy life, may lessen the pain if worst comes to worst and we have to put him to sleep.

 

[JBun]

How long it takes for a rabbit to come out of stasis depends on the severity of it and what caused it to begin with. Longest I had a rabbit go through it was 2 weeks, as his case was pretty severe. It was a roller coaster. He would start to seem a little better then not want to eat anything again and seem uncomfortable, but gradually he improved.

GI stasis is just an effect of something else that is going on, whether a simple case of an upset stomach from something the rabbit ate, from bloat, from a dental problem, injury, or another internal health issue. How soon it clears up and if it does, depends on what precisely caused your rabbit to stop eating to begin with.

With the weakness you are describing with your rabbit, that is very concerning. Sitting loafed up and being inactive is a common symptom of stasis, but if your rabbit is showing actual weakness and unsteadiness, that makes me suspect there could be something very serious going on that is the underlying cause of the stasis. It's unfortunate the vet wasn't able to get the blood test done to rule out kidney or liver problems, or even an underlying infection. Combined with the weight loss, if your rabbit is showing unusual and actual weakness and unsteadiness, I would suggest getting in touch with your vet right away. This is not a normal symptom of typical GI stasis.

With the soft poop, if he isn't producing any normal round fecal poop and it is coming out all watery or pudding like, that is an emergency from possible enterotoxemia. If there is normal round fecal poop, but it's the cecals coming out mushy, it's possible that's due to the stasis and the food changes.

Pain medication should have been given for you to administer orally at home from the start. Meloxicam/metacam is what is usually prescribed. It's an anti inflammatory pain reliever, but doesn't decrease gas if that's an issue. A gas med is needed for that.

Pain meds is a normal thing to be prescribed for GI stasis. Since you weren't given it to begin with, I'm now wondering what meds your rabbit was given? Were you given any gut stimulant meds?

 

[Kaninmor]

Update.

Last night Balder deteriorated very fast and just passed away. We felt a bit like the pain meds helped him relax and just let go. We are incredibly sad, but at the same time glad he's not suffering anymore. I agree he had some underlying issues, it all just happened so quickly after starting out "innocently" like he had just gotten something he didn't tolerate, so we got a bit blindsided. It's also a comfort to know that he had a really good life and was a generally happy and very loving bunny. Fortunately our remaining bunny seems to have more robust health (than the lops we've had), we'll make sure to take extra good care of her now. She'll be grieving too

Thank you all for your kind and helpful answers. We did not get any medicine and while our vets are nice, they are a bit vague and in our case they just kept saying "we are very concerned that he is so weak" rather than saying straight out "everything points to that your rabbit is dying". I wish they would rather just say it straight out.

 

[zuppa]

Sorry to hear that, he had long and happy life with you and 10 is a very good age, maybe it was just his time to go. Hope your other rabbit will take it easy, maybe you can get her a friend so she won't feel alone.

 

[Kaninmor]

Thank you! Yes, we try to take comfort in that he was a senior with a long and happy life behind him and obviously we're glad he's not in pain anymore. We just miss him so much, he was such a sweet and kind bunny We're looking out for his partner, she got to say her goodbyes and I think she has accepted that he is gone, in the sense that she understands he's not coming back. She's a very intelligent and perceptive little girl. She seems to have more robust health and we hope we'll have her for many more years.