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Crusty red spot on belly

Wiebke said:
Thank you! The picture will be of course credited to you.

It may be actually helpful if you could document the development over the coming week (which should normally be enough to stop the ringworm; 10 days in a bit worse case) so we can incorporate your pictures into our guide and help to reassure another skinny owner sometime down the line... ;)

But please rest assured that you can get on top of it pretty easily if you are thorough and follow our guide. Thankfully this year our hygiene recommendations look a lot less over the top than in previous years!
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Thank you so much again and yes I will definitely try and document as much as I can and keep you update. Going to book an appointment, clean the cage and bathe them all tomorrow to hopefully get on top of it asap.
 
Just been to the vets and the vet said it's a fungal infection. He recommended just making sure to clean the bedding throughly and daily and to apply daktarin cream on the affected areas daily 😊
 
TillyTrueman said:
Just been to the vets and the vet said it's a fungal infection. He recommended just making sure to clean the bedding throughly and daily and to apply daktarin cream on the affected areas daily 😊
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I’m afraid that is poor veterinary advice as the appropriate treatment is oral systemic treatment with itrafungol.
 
VickiA said:
Please just confirm - the nizoral is for you, not the piggies. bathing in Nizoral is not recommended for piggies.
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Oh right. I actually thought it was for the piggies. Also should I keep them all separated whilst I do their treatments?
 
Has the vet really only given you the daktarin for local treatment? No at least a medicated shampoo or dip or preferably oral itrafungal as the most effective treatment? :eek:

Creaming is very outdated because it is not exactly the most effective way of treating ringworm; you can't reach the full extent of the affected area because it is much wider than the bald spot. How piggy savvy is that vet?

Please be aware that you can get away with 1 bath of nizoral for piggies but not with the necessary full course of bathing every 3 days for at least 3-4 times as that is very harsh on the skin; especially in skinnies with their extra delicate skin. One bath of nizoral and a bit of creaming is not enough, sorry. :(

If you had read the ringworm guide link properly before seeing the vet, you would have found exactly this information in there and could have asked your vet for better treatment. If you want to really get on top of ringworm and not have more rounds with it, then it is not the time to skimp.

We have seen several forum members come back with more anf worse ringworm weeks later because they just creamed. Our recommendations in the guide are based on ample experience and are not there just for the fun of getting members to spending more money... :(
 
Wiebke said:
Has the vet really only given you the daktarin for local treatment? No medicated shampoo or dip at least or preferably oral itrafungal as the most effective? :eek:

Creaming is very outdated because it is not exactly the most effective way of treating; you can't reach the full extent of the affected area because it is much wider than the bald spot. How piggy savvy is that vet?

Please be aware that you can get away with 1 bath of nizoral for piggies but not with the necessary full course of bathing every 3 days for at least 3-4 times as that is very harsh on the skin; especially in skinnies with their extra delicate skin. One bath of nizoral and a bit of creaming is not enough, sorry. :(

If you had read the ringworm guide link properly before seeing the vet, you would have found exactly this information in there and could have asked your vet for better treatment. If you want to really get on top of ringworm and not have more rounds with it, then it is not the time to skimp.

We have seen several forum members come back with more anf worse ringworm weeks later because they just creamed. Our recommendations in the guide are based on ample experience and are not there just for the fun of getting members to spending more money... :(
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Oh god. I don't know what to do now. And I wasnt allowed to go in and talk to the vet so the receptionist just came back and told me to put the cream on the affected area and that's it. Along with lots of cleaning. I've ordered the F10 disinfectant along with shampoo.
 
I would speak to the vet again and/or find a different vet.
lt is now normal to not be able to go in, but in my visit to vets during restrictions (there have been several) , the vet has always come out and spoken to me after the consultation, they’ve never sent a receptionist out to relay a message
 
Piggies&buns said:
I would speak to the vet again and/or find a different vet.
lt is now normal to not be able to go in, but in my visit vets during restrictions (there have been several) , the vet has always come out and spoken to me after the consultation, they’ve never sent a receptionist out to relay a message
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Okay ill give them a ring back and relay this information and let you know what they say.
 
I'm sorry you are going through this.it can be easily treated if the guidelines are followed.take a deep breath and chill ! there is a vet locator at the top ,this may help to find a piggy savvy vet near you.i have found it easier to write down any questions or corcerns,background information on a piece of paper to the treating vet.ive had ringworm in some of my piggies in the high humidity this summer,and followed the guidelines,it all cleared up within a week,4 weeks for hair to grow back.:hug::hug::hug:
 
That's odd, even when a vet did only give me a cream for it it was a prescribed steroid cream not daktarin. It cleared up the piggy in question but didn't help as two of the others came down with it as I hadn't treated the whole piggy so obviously there were still spores being spread
 
TillyTrueman said:
Oh right. I actually thought it was for the piggies. Also should I keep them all separated whilst I do their treatments?
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Yes, you keep the acutely affected and the not yet affected piggies apart. The acute ones need a full course of either medicated dips and shampoos or of oral medication plus one bath at the end to wash out any spores sitting in the coat.

The not affected piggies only need one bath/dip (a dip is where you don't rinse and let the lathered stuff dry on the body) in order to prevent them coming down with it when you deep clean the cage and launder all their stuff at a higher temperature. Alternatively, they can have several days on itrafungol to prevent them developing it plus a suitable piggy bath to wash out any spores in their coat.

You can find all these questions and more addressed in the ringworm care guide. PLEASE read it before you rush out again: Ringworm: Hygiene And Pictures

As to vets: You get the service you pay for.
You have three tiers of vet services - the no frills cheap basic treatment vet chains of general vets like the ones associated with pet shop chains; they are keeping the cost down by only stocking a limited range of basic medication, many of which won't have much experience with guinea pigs, as they are classed as exotics. it is basically your luck of the draw whether you see a piggy savvy or not. Although there some laudable exceptions, which are listed in our vet locator.
The next tier up are independent or small chain vet clinics. Again, they are general vets and their piggy savviness can vary a lot. The ones in the smaller chains may have recourse to an exotics vet. They do generally stock a somewhat wider range of medication but that means you pay more.
Exotics vets stock a wide range of medication and will dispense not just the very few medicaments that are officially licensed for guinea pigs, especially for more complex health problems. But this comes at a noticeably higher cost.
You can find more information on vets in this link here: A guide to vets fees, insurance and payment support.
Here is our recommended vets locator: Vet Locator
 
eileen said:
I'm sorry you are going through this.it can be easily treated if the guidelines are followed.take a deep breath and chill ! there is a vet locator at the top ,this may help to find a piggy savvy vet near you.i have found it easier to write down any questions or corcerns,background information on a piece of paper to the treating vet.ive had ringworm in some of my piggies in the high humidity this summer,and followed the guidelines,it all cleared up within a week,4 weeks for hair to grow back.:hug::hug::hug:
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Just spoken to another vet and got his opinion and he said there's no reason that the cream shouldn't work and if I was to go down the oral or shampoo treatment it can run up loads of get bills. He said to stick with it and if it doesn't get better then to go back and it is most likely something more serious. So that's what I'll do because I'm sure the vet knows what he's talking about.
 
Piggies&buns said:
Not treating it properly from the beginning can also run up large vet bills as it will be a longer, more drawn out process to get it dealt with
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You will have to pay the standard consultation fee on top of any medication every time you have to see a vet again over the same issue... and in the end have too pay for the more expensive medication after a lot more hassle and expense. We have unfortunately seen that a bit too often on here. :(

But it's your choice whether you want to throw the kitchen sink at it now or leave it and risk another flare up.
 
I foster for a rescue. We see many, many piggies with fungal infections. We are always keen to keep vets bills down as we have to fundraise for every penny that we spend on the piggies, but our experience of fungal matches Wiebke’s comments. Treating with topical creams only does not effectively kill off the spores and the outbreaks drag on, and on, and can spread to other piggies and humans. Ringworm is always a cleaning nightmare and very expensive and time consuming to get rid of.
 
VickiA said:
I foster for a rescue. We see many, many piggies with fungal infections. We are always keen to keep vets bills down as we have to fundraise for every penny that we spend on the piggies, but our experience of fungal matches Wiebke’s comments. Treating with topical creams only does not effectively kill off the spores and the outbreaks drag on, and on, and can spread to other piggies and humans. Ringworm is always a cleaning nightmare and very expensive and time consuming to get rid of.
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I'm just going to follow the vets advice as I've spoken to two now and they obviously know what their doing with years if experience and training.
 
PigglePuggle said:
Then one does rather wonder why you are asking here... just an observation after you have had excellent advice from 2 experts there!
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I'm sorry I'm just going through as really difficult situation at the moment and due to personal reasons I can't take them back to another vet until next week now so am just having to do the best with what I have. I have taken many of people's advice on here, including ordering the special shampoo as well as F10 disinfectant and taking them to the vets in the first place. All I'm saying is that 2 professionals have now recommended to treat it with this cream and until I can go back to the vet that is what I will have to do.
 
In my experience (and my professional opinion!) if a vet prescribed topical treatments only you would have surolan to apply directly to the lesion and mycazole spray to cover the rest of the fur/body, and after a week/10 days of this the vet would be taking a skin scrape and fur samples for dermatophyte culture to check that the ringworm was actually gone not just superficially looking better. And you would continue treatment until the test came back as a definite negative.
Apart from the Maddocks in Northampton I doubt there are any vets anywhere in the world with more guinea pig experience than our @Wiebke !
I am sorry if you have personal issues that are affecting your ability to seek and afford appropriate treatment, but I'm afraid if you ask for advice here it will always be the best advice not a compromise- in future others may come across your thread and assume that they should also treat with daktarin, which really isnt what we would recommend... so if you ask, we have to be clear about what we would recommend, to help people in the future who might read this...
 
Unfortunately I can't really take it seriously as I've rang my mum and she said 'it's not a big deal' and that I need to stop stressing and taking it so seriously. I'm cleaning the entire room that they live in and their whole cage and separing them and she said that it's not really necessary. She said that it's really hard to spread and catch off them. So this is why I haven't been able to take all the necessary precautions that you have all recommended. She said she doesn't want to spend loads of money on treatment and vet care and just to stick with what we've got. If it we're me, I'd be taking all of the necessary precautions and be doing everything you guys have recommended but I can't because my mum isn't taking it seriously. We (me and my sister) keep trying to explain to her that we need to bathe them and use special treatments and probably go back to another vet ect but she doesn't want to hear it and refuses to spend too much money. We care about our guinea pigs so much and take such good care of them and they have such a large enclosure but due to my mother we can't always provide then with the best care as her main concern is money but we try our best with what we have. Many apologies if you think I haven't been taking it seriously or following your advice. I often have to put alot of my ownem savings towards it due to her not wanting to bother.
-Tilly
 
I'm really sorry that your mum isn't taking this seriously. I assume you live with her and are financially dependent on her at the moment to not be able to take them to the vets yourself? If you are earning money and know you can contribute something you could speak directly with the vets practice and they may be able to arrange a payment plan for you as I am sure they appreciate that covid has impacted many people's jobs.
 
You are of course free to do whatever you decide to do. However, if you ask for advice on a forum like this you must be prepared for the responses you receive. Otherwise you are in reality wasting our time. We are all volunteers giving up our time to help the welfare of piggies and their humans. Believe me, there is nothing in it for us when we tell you the correct way to treat fungal infections is not to simply apply shop bought fungal cream from a chemist.

I must just again stress (as your response above is misleading) that on this forum we did not recommend that you buy special shampoo to bathe the piggies in. Our responses and our guide do not say that. I accept that we do recommend f10 for deep cleaning of cages but that is only one part of a multi pronged approach.

As for transmission from piggies to humans it is real not just a scare tactic. Only a week or so ago I saw that an acquaintance (not through the rescue) who had taken in piggies with fungal had ringworm on her face, neck and arms. Not fun at all. That’s why in the rescue we wear long sleeves, an apron and disposable gloves when handling fungal or suspected fungal piggies.

Can I ask how old you are?
 
TillyTrueman said:
I'm just going to follow the vets advice as I've spoken to two now and they obviously know what their doing with years if experience and training.
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I have asked you which vets you are registered with on another thread. Please can you let me know as this is clearly an issue we might wish to raise with them.
 
VickiA said:
I have asked you which vets you are registered with on another thread. Please can you let me know as this is clearly an issue we might wish to raise with them.
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We're not registered with a vet. I just ran one up and took them. I asked my mum to register us with a vet for our piggies and she refused. She goes on about saying how she's had a guinea pig before and all this 'faffing' about with vets and extra stuff isn't necessary. So we don't have a particular vet we go to. This was the first time we'd taken any pigs to a vet since getting them. We've had 2 for 8months 1 for 6months and the other 2 for 4 months. It has been a learn as we go process, we do have alot of experience with animals, having many rodents and reptiles and working at horse stables, so do have a rough idea but before these we haven't owned guinea pigs. Sorry for wasting anyone's time🙏🏻🙏🏻😕
 
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