Qingqing has another wound

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Thanks for the suggestions above. Am still baffled, but will keep looking and thinking. The wound looks like it's infected now. I was planning on taking her to the vet tomorrow, because a student found a vet who might know rabbits. If I can, I'll take her today, but I'm not sure if I can find a student who is free. Here are photos from today, three days after I found the wound. In the first, she is taking a rest after eating.

IMG_1094.jpg


This one I took while holding her with my left hand and taking the picture with the right hand. Not an easy thing to do with a bunny who hates to be held! Then I put the antibiotic ointment on myself and the collar. It's easier with two, but possible (most of the time) with one. I'll keep the collar on for an hour or so, to let the medicine sink in.

IMG_1095.jpg

 
I should add that the black part (scab, I assume) is sunken and the skin around it is red and puffy. I got my nose close to the wound and didn't smell anything bad. I don't know if necrotic wounds smell bad or not.

She's still eating and jumping around as usual, bless her heart.
 
:(aww poor you your having a bad time at the moment , yest the wound looks to be infected what you need to to and i must state ever bunny first aid box should always have the following in

you need to dobathe in very warm salt water use wet cotton wool , once you have done that you need to treat with dermisol cream it eats away all the bad stuff you get it from the vet you could also use horse wound powder too it has some antibiotic in it works wonders you get that from any horse shop , a quick corse of antibiotics wouldnt go a miss either

as to how she has done it i guess she lives alone so a bite is out of the question, she could be doing it heself , could be catching it on her cage somewhere , does she go out in the garden alot it could be a abcess caused by a grass seed getting in they can work there ways out anywhere on the body and leave a abcess behind

good luck
 
I went to see a vet this afternoon. He and his assistant seemed to know what they were doing. Even though I was concerned about the wound being infected, he wasn't concerned. He checked her over, talked with my student for a long time, and sold me medicine for her. There's something (which looks like iodine) that is for the swelling, and a spray medicine for the infection. He didn't recommend any antibiotic shots, saying rabbit skin was delicate and shots were a last resort. I may continue the shots anyways if the wound looks worse tomorrow. I had my student ask if he could tell how the wounds were caused. He talked to her for a long time. Later I asked what he had said. She said that basically all he said was that he didn't know!

The vet and his assistant studied the wound carefully, even pinching and squeezing it. Qingqing was a real trouper.

He also checked out the lump on her jaw. After her wound heals, he'll contact his university, the NorthWest Agricultural University, and check on getting an x-ray there. I will make sure they know how to anesthetize a rabbit before I consent to an x-ray.

Thanks for the advice from the UK. I'll see how the wound looks tomorrow.

She never goes outside, so she couldn't have gotten any seeds in her skin. Tomorrow I'm going to hire some students to help me do a super-good cleaning in her room, looking for evidence of rats or spiders. There is some cardboard clutter in a far corner that I need help to get to.

I understand that she may be doing this to herself. I hope it's not true, as I don't know how I would stop it. I hope that when I do the deep cleaning and searching, that my students and I will find the cause, either a critter or evidence of a place where she hurt herself.
 
Ivory wrote:
Pam, what I meant was, the wounds themselves don't follow what self-mutilation generally looks like. The first one I could understand, but this one looks much more like a spider or other kind of bite.
Click to expand...

A spider bite through the rabbit's thick fur would be unlikely. Necrosis from a spider bite generally follows a circular pattern and has a definite center where the bite occured. The surrounding tissue is also more extensively effected as the necrosis spreads. In the photos, the surrounding tissue is very healthy and isn't following the classic spread pattern of a bite - note the lack of an obvious center in the wound and the uneven shape. Also note how fur is missing on the healthy sections of tissues (in the first photo before treatment). Most likely that the rabbit is licking and removing the fur itself.

The woulds appear to be animal bite wounds, either inflicted by the rabbit itself, or another animal.

A collar would help answer the question, because the rabbit would no longer be able to chew itself.

Pam
 
Good point. :)

I wonder what could cause her to be doing this to herself.
 
oh poor Quinquing! i also don't know exactly what's going on here, but it would be wonderful if you found a rabbit-savvy vet. that looks like it must hurt a lot! she is such a beautiful bunny and i hope you can get her back to feeling okay soon.
 
Wednesday update:

The wound is looking less red today and more pinkish.

I paid three students four dollars each (which is far above the going rate for labor; I know these are poor students) to thoroughly clean Qingqing's room. First, we took everything out of it, then they cleaned the floor and walls, then we through away the cardboard she had been playing with and washed the old clothes I had given her, then we put her the things back in there. I decided to throw out anything that she had played with, just in case. We washed off the things that we put back in the room. So she has a super-clean room now.

We found no signs of rats, mice or spiders. We found nothing that could have hurt her in there. So either she somehow has hurt herself in the rest of the apartment when she has free run (though I am here when she has free run) or she is self-mutilating.
 
Thanks for asking. The wound is healing slowly, but the patient is doing well. I have used the medicine that the Chinese vet gave me for five days, but I'm going to go back to a regular antibiotic ointment today. The vet gave me something that seems to be iodine or Betadine to put on first, then something that is sprayed on. Neither has English, so I don't know what they are. What I do know is that the iodine-looking thing is causing my bunny's urine to turn red and smelly. I put a collar on for an hour after applying the medicine, but of course when I take it off, she goes right for the wound and starts licking. I'm guessing that it's not good for her to lick the iodine stuff, and I"m tired of smelling the bad smell! The first wound healed faster, so I"m going to go back to the antibiotic ointment I used then. I also used an antifungal, but this wound doesn't seem to itch her.

I had a weekend houseguest who is allergic to small animals, so Qingqing had to stay in her room for the last three days. He left this morning, so Qingqing is now in her favorite spot, under the right-hand corner of my bed. Oh, and it's nice that her room is so clean now! My students did a super job of cleaning the room from top to bottom last week. All three are farmers' daughters and are used to helping their moms around the house.
 
Hope your bun heals quickly and that you find the cause. I still have that feeling that she is doing it to herself. Sounds hormonal to me. (If the article is right on about self-mutilation then I guess this is a possibility)
 
Yes, since I haven't been able to find any other cause, I have to assume that she's doing this to herself.

I re-read the items on the link provided. There was one new possibility on one of the pages. It said that there can be skin problems after injections, and mentioned Enrofloxacin by name. Well, she's had four shots of that in the last month. I'm working on trying to remember exactly where those shots were given.

Here's a shot of how it looks now:

IMG_1100.jpg


The yellow part on the outside at the bottom is crusty. That didn't happen with the first wound.


 
Bless her heart, poor bunny.

If it is injection related, and not done by herself, then maybe fuciderm might help? After Badger had his VHD jab he got lots of bald patches on his side (a bit further bac from where Qingqing's are) and the biggest one had a sore in the middle. The vet prescribed fuciderm and it healed up SO quickly. He still has a bald patch now, but the sore is gone. Not sure if that's helpful or not, but it might be.

Keep up the good work for her, you're doing a great job.
 
I regret that I don't remember exactly where she got the shots. A student who was there when she got one, said that it was close to where this second wound is.

I took her to the vet again today. She's not doing well. The wound has spread downwards, to the beginning of her leg. The older part is looking better. The scab is still there. The vet wanted to take the scab off today, saying that liguid under the scab was seeping downward and that's why the wound was spreading. The scab wasn't ready to come off, so he put vinegar around it. I'm supposed to continue putting vinegar on it, to soften up the scab. I thought that sounded crazy, but some students told me that when they were kids and got fish bones stuck in their throat, their mother would make them drink vinegar to soften the bone so it would go down the throat.

I brought a sample of her urine to the vet. I think she has blood in it. The vet said it was too old to test. I should bring fresh urine. The urine is dark to medium red/rust color. I don't know if this is from her licking the wound, from an internal problem or something in her poop is turning the urine red. The smell isn't good. If a female rabbit has cancer, would there be blood in her urine?

Qingqing has lost .25 kilo in the last two weeks. That's about half a pound. She weighed 3.75 kilos two weeks ago, and 3.5 today.

Another thing: Four days ago her poops started to be half their normal size. That continued for two days. Now they are getting bigger, but they are still smaller than normal. She is still eating ok, even with the weight loss.

I understand that there may be something seriously wrong with her.

If she had cancer, could that cause skin problems like this?

Poor little bunny.
 
I just forwarded all of the info you've provided to the Etherbun mailing list. I'm hoping someone with a fresh look at this situation could possibly help.

((hugs))
 
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