Resolved! Dotty looking better

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No problem with watery, the more hydration the better, really.

I'm a bit surprised that more Metacam was given, I was half-expecting her to be taken off of it.

When Pipp had surgery and was on Metacam, her urine was very concentrated and I noticed she was straining to pee and getting lethargic. Luckily I noticed it right away and realized that she was dehydrated and thus the Metacam was a big problem. I took her off of it, filled her full of liquids and it cleared up right away, hopefully with no kidney damage.

I'm not sure why Dotty would be in more pain on day five, although I agree that days two and three are worse than one.

sas :expressionless
 
Pipp wrote:
No problem with watery, the more hydration the better, really.

I'm a bit surprised that more Metacam was given, I was half-expecting her to be taken off of it.

When Pipp had surgery and was on Metacam, her urine was very concentrated and I noticed she was straining to pee and getting lethargic. Luckily I noticed it right away and realized that she was dehydrated and thus the Metacam was a big problem. I took her off of it, filled her full of liquids and it cleared up right away, hopefully with no kidney damage.

I'm not sure why Dotty would be in more pain on day five, although I agree that days two and three are worse than one.

sas :expressionless
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Really? I hadn't thought of it that way. I kind of linked the surgery and the not eating and came up with pain, without really considering that... It would make sense as well considering that she had been ok up until then. I've been thinking so much about how we didn't want her to be in pain that really hadn't occured to me :headsmack

I do have some good news though- she ate some basil!! Just one very leafy stem's worth, but at least it's something?

We'll keep giving her more fluids tonight, as much as she will take. I guess we'll be calling the vets in the morning if she's not better by then.... If we can make it lol- it's snowing very hard right now! :shock:


Thank you sas!
 
Basil is good for the tummy too, so if you can get her to eat more it would be great. Most of the mint-family herbs are good for tummy aches.

I usually end up adding at least double the amount of water for Critical Care. The normal amount is so dry and thick, I only use that for making little mush balls for them to eat on their own. Nothing wrong with addingmore water since she needs the fluids anyway.
 
naturestee wrote:
Basil is good for the tummy too, so if you can get her to eat more it would be great. Most of the mint-family herbs are good for tummy aches.

I usually end up adding at least double the amount of water for Critical Care. The normal amount is so dry and thick, I only use that for making little mush balls for them to eat on their own. Nothing wrong with addingmore water since she needs the fluids anyway.
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Basil is good for the tummy? Well I'm learning lots today lol! I never knew that...

Steve had it laid in the bowls for the other pairs of bunnies, and left them in the kitchen while he took Dotty's up. Then when she ate a bit he came back down and swapped their Basil out lol :p We're low so we'll have to stock up tomorrow....


She wouldn't eat any more though :(

That's good about the critical care. there's no way I could get it into a syringe if I didn't add loads more water. It was doing that bungee thing..... :shock: I'd already cut the end off, and squirted who knows how much at the tiles in the bathroom! I was worried that too much water would sort of wash away the nutrients or something, but I could swear I read a post in the infirmary a while ago, can't remember who by, that said that critical care absorbs a lot of moisture so to soak it for a while so it doesn't absorb moisture in the gut? I tried looking for it earlier but I couldn't remember for the life of me which thread it was in lol...


 
Only just saw the thread now. So sorry to hear Dotty had a set back in her recovery.Have no great advice to dispense just virtual hugs and noserubs. Hope she'll get better soon
 
Another thing you might offer if you have a safe source for it is fresh grass. Be sure it has not been chemically treated (at least recently) and that there has been ample rain since any chemical treatment to wash awayanything that has not been absorbed into the soil. Grass should be washed immediately before feeding (either by you or Mother Nature).

Fresh grass is recommended in Harcourt-Brown's Textbook of Rabbit Medicine as one of the best sources of both digestable and indigestable fiber and as one of the first things most rabbits will gravitate toward eating.

LastNovember when my Apollo was slower than Iliked abouteating after amolar trim, I decided to try this. Although we do have a lawn service, they had left a note about three weeks earlier stating that they couldn't apply their treatment because of all the leaves on the ground ... and we had gotten some good rains since then. I went out in the pouring rain and picked the most tender rain-soaked grass I could find. Apollo gobbled it down ... and shortly after began munching hay.

May I ask why the aversion to using metoclopromide? Dr. Allan has me give it to rabbits who bounce back slowly after anesthesia (we know who those are), in part for its anti-nausea properties. I have found the injectable to be significantly more effective than the oral form. We generally do twice a day for a couple of days, then once a day for a couple of days.

Kathy Smith
 
Most of us feel that metoclopromide and cisapride are a 'crap shoot"

Things may go well but there is a risk

We encourage natural methods to encourage elimination particulary after a surgery.
(increased hydration, pain meds. exercise as tolerated, tummy massages as tolerated, tasty greens etc )

Ihave read (cannot quote source off the top) that not all GI obstructions are able to bevisiulizedupon x-ray and because ofthis there is always the potential ofreglan speeding the emptying of the stomach with increased peristalsisand subsequent rupture of the stomach from a blockage. One of our members had her rabbit die afterbeing given a dose of reglan although she had been x-rayed

Randy feels it is painful to the rabbit and has said that he would never never use those drugs. he has never elaborated on his experiences but I believe that he has developed this attitude for a good reason.
Another one of our members has a rabbit that needs it all the time and continually needs to be weaned off it only to need it again. I do believe that it can be addictive (like laxative use)

The CNS affects are also considered a concern. It can cause tardive dyskinesia in humans

I guess that we discourage use of both motility drugs because of negative experiences with the drugs that we have had ourselves or stories of negative experiences from others..

Cisapride has been removed off the market for humans ( although I believe that it is because it interacts poorly with many other drugs commonly prescribed)although cisapide is considered the less dangerous of the 2. I have read that even its use in horses at this point is being scrutinized

All of us know vets that precribe it and even vets that do notdo x-rays initially before prescribing it.

We also discourage the use of petroleum products like laxatone, petromalt etc.

I would use cisapride if nothing else helped but I would have to try everything else before I would use it without fear.


Maureen


 
My favorite of my two rabbit vets does not use gut motility drugs unless he feels there is no other option. He's seen just as much bad as good come from it, thinks they're over used, and suspects they cause some pain. If the gut seems to be moving at all he prefers not to use them.Hehas prescribed them for me twice- once in acase of sudden, complete gut shutdown (rabbit died that nightand had bled some from her anus, her prognosis had been very very poor, no necropsy done).The other was for my chronicly ill orphan bun who was a few weeks old at the time. An xray showed that her cecum wasn't emptying properly and the motility drugs fixed the problem and there hasn't been a recurrence.

My other vet likes to prescribe gut motility drugs for any GI slowdown but I generally refuse when they're still pooping some.

I hadn't thought of fresh grass as I'm still deep in snow, but that was how we got baby Dora to eat willingly when recovering from that first near-deadly case of enteritis. She even ate grass during the one hour drive to the vet. Her mouth was too little to eat pellets and she wasn'tvery interested in her milk replacement.


 
Interesting <gr> I have definitely heard about the risks of the motility drugs and stronglyagree caution is required when they are used. I insist on x-rays before using them except in cases where teeth or ear problems isidentified as the primary cause for "loss of appetite."Ihave also heard from a couple of vets(and have had the experience with one of my buns) that some obstructions are "functional" rather than physical (same symptoms, but no physical obstruction found surgically).

After dentals, if my guys come home and start eating right awayand continue the next day I don't give meds. If they are slow to start eating again, we treat for both pain and nausea (metoclopromide injections). Usually a dayor two is all that is required.

I have also had personal experience with a bunny (Murray) becoming "dependent" on these drugs, so I am much more cautious than I used to be about both starting them and using them long term. OTOH, I can't imagine not having metoclopromide (Banamine too) on hand and using them (under my vet's supervision, of course).

Kathy Smith


 
Umm..I suspect your primary problem is pain....third days are the worst. Metacam is better than nothing but spays should include a narcotic aspect. Buprenorphine is by far the best. I usually insist on that drug for at least 3 days and up to 5....never had any problem whatsoever.

And I saw the naughty words....metoclopramide and cisapride and the like. There is no possibility of those drugs ever being used on any of my rabbits....and if any vet were to suggest it, we would be headed toward the door. Fortunately, none of my vets feel they are appropriate for rabbits and neither do I. I have probably treated tougher gut problems than most vets.....resolved them all without those drugs.

In my non-professional opinion, they are not designed for a rabbit gut. Most of you know that these drugs, by different methods, induce contractions much like cramps. I am sure all of you have experienced stomach cramps and how painful they can be. Think of how rabbits respond to pain. The contractions compact ingesta impactions into a denser and dryer mass. That is the exact opposite of what is needed. The correct response is to disintegrate the mass....not make it tighter. This mass seems to increasingly extract hydration from the intestinal tract. Once it starts, it is a cascading issue. It also appears that GI events can lead to gastric ulcers. An ulcer will cause an already thin abdominal wall to become even thinner. And when you add the stress of contractions, there is a high probability of perforating that ulcer. And there is only one resolution to that.

Again in my non-professional opinion based on my many years of working with rabbits, the use of gut motility drugs harken from the time when little was known about a rabbit and it was considered proper to treat them like a cat. I base my medical treatments weighing the potential benefits of a given treatment against the known negatives.....and in my opinion, if a rabbit is involved, the best place for GI motility drugs are in their bottle waiting for a dog or cat. I have never used them, never will allow any vet to give them to one of my rabbits and after I am dead ifsomeone gives a motility drug to one of my rabbits, I will come back to haunt them. If you truly understand the dynamics of a rabbit's gut, there are more effective and certainly safer methods of getting a gut moving. And I have my opinion on vets that continue to use these drugs. But I also see something from their side too.....and I can, in a way, see why they prescribe these drugs.

I rarely have problems post-op but if I did, proper pain management,judicial use of supplemental fluids and a B Comp injection would be my preferred response. That is standard practice we use in wildlife. Works great with minimal chances of negative side effects.

To give an idea of how strong the contractions are....there is a specific warning to human doctorsreferencing to the strength of the induced contractions post-op....and particularly abdominal surgery that the contractions could "stress" the sutures. And if I remember correctly, it is used for heartburn in some patients which means it also has some type of antacid quality....and I prefer to keep the pH where it should be with a rabbit.

Again, in my opinion, too much risk for the extremely remote chance of anything positive.....never, and I mean never, will any motility drug be used with any of my rabbits.

Randy
 
Thanks everyone for your replies :D

She's doing better this morning, I think! *knocks on wood* We gave her 28ml of critical care last night, along with 20ml of water and about 10-15ml of baby food. I heard her eating hay in the night- she lives in our bedroom so I hear everything she does lol.

Unfortunately I am on new anti-dizziness meds which knocked me right out and the room was spinning too violently this morning for me to get up- but I vaguely remember Steve telling me she was eating lots of Basil. In fact, he's just been out for more, and could only get the plants from morrisons, and she's just eaten all the basil from one of them (UK members will know what I mean, but they're small plants, we washed them first).

I juiced some fresh pineapple and gave her some of the juice- she took that from the syringe very happily- didn't even have to pick her up! I left a little bowl of it up there watered down to encourage her to drink more, but Steve has just informed me that her 'big noggin' wont fit in the bowl so I have to go and change it!

She's been running about a bit and doing binkies- which horrified me but she honestly doesn't seem to be in any pain at all. She's lying flopped and comfy, not hunched, she's not grinding her teeth or anything.... :? In fact, she's more lively today than she has been since the surgery...



Randy, I know that the vets give some sort of long-lasting pain shot at the time of the spay, but other than that, I really don't know what painkillers are available for rabbits over here. The only thing I've ever been given for them is Metacam....


The metaclopromide thing: I'm mixed, but then I'm no expert. They have been used in our bunnies before, and haven't had any adverse effects. With a couple of Chalk's surgeries, she was given it, and got better very soon after, although I don't know if it was that, the syringe feeding or a combination of both that helped. We've never had a problem with it, but I've only heard bad things about it from others. I do know that some of the less rabbit-savvy vets in the group (my vets are part of a large group with several practices and a large hospital across the city) and some locums will just jump in with that without considering any other possibilities. That's what I was referring to- we've seen vets who have said 'oh she seems fine, we'll just give her an injection to get her guts going' when I've been asking to check their teeth, consider x-rays, etc.


And Kathy, thanks for your reply! The grass suggestion is great- our garden is covered in about 2 inches of snow at the moment, but it's starting to melt, so I'll go and take a look later and see how it's looking. I've fed it to the others before when they've been sick, although I've found strangely enough, that they prefer to 'pick it' themselves. They wont eat it if I pick it for them and bring inside, but if I've put a sick bunny outside in the garden, they've munched away happily. Can't hurt to try it with Dotty though...


 
I am so glad to hear that she is doing so well

it sounds like she is truly "over the hump' and getting back to her old self.
very glad for all of you :)
 
I'm glad she's feeling better. I have heard about those long-lasting pain shots, and what I read is that they last 2hr--definitely not long enough. In any case, she's doing better, and will continue to do so, I'm sure!

Healing thoughts~~
 
I'm glad to hear she is doing well.

Come on Dotty!
 
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