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Dental issues but no signs?

I would go with the surgery too. How old is your piggy?

Here’s Peppers thread about his tooth root abscess. It’s full of so much amazing advice from everyone on here. It’s quite a long thread but it will give you an idea of what’s to come. Obviously your experience will be different to Peppers. I asked so many questions on it I felt so stressed at one point. Good luck.

Dental? Pepper is off to the vets tomorrow
 
I agree with those above. She can’t continue how she is now for the rest of her life (and neither can you, constant syringe feeding is so draining) and the surgery gives her a shot at getting back to normality. It’s worth trying definitely! Hope you’re okay following this news, not the best outcome but at least you have some answers now
 
weepweeps said:
I would go with the surgery too. How old is your piggy?

Here’s Peppers thread about his tooth root abscess. It’s full of so much amazing advice from everyone on here. It’s quite a long thread but it will give you an idea of what’s to come. Obviously your experience will be different to Peppers. I asked so many questions on it I felt so stressed at one point. Good luck.

Dental? Pepper is off to the vets tomorrow
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We rescued Floof right at the start of lockdown and she didn't seem fully grown. At most I'd say she's around 4? So, she's not particularly young but isn't showing any signs of age. (Despite these new jaw issues..) Thank you for sharing that thread, I'll have a good read!

Thank you, everyone. We've decided to push ahead with the surgery on Friday. I'm pretty scared. Last time I had a guinea go in for surgery, she didn't come back out. But at least we tried. I think not trying would be worse for us/her. I'm very nervous at the idea of maintaining and cleaning an abscess site and I can't even begin to understand how I'll syringe feed a piggy with an open face wound but I'm going to learn and try my best, for my little Floof.
 
I think you are making the right decision. I’m sorry that you lost a piggy during surgery but like you say, you gave her a chance and that’s all we can do and Floof will be in great hands with Simon. I will be thinking of you and floof tomorrow x
 
AbbieMiddleton said:
We rescued Floof right at the start of lockdown and she didn't seem fully grown. At most I'd say she's around 4? So, she's not particularly young but isn't showing any signs of age. (Despite these new jaw issues..) Thank you for sharing that thread, I'll have a good read!

Thank you, everyone. We've decided to push ahead with the surgery on Friday. I'm pretty scared. Last time I had a guinea go in for surgery, she didn't come back out. But at least we tried. I think not trying would be worse for us/her. I'm very nervous at the idea of maintaining and cleaning an abscess site and I can't even begin to understand how I'll syringe feed a piggy with an open face wound but I'm going to learn and try my best, for my little Floof.
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My Little was 6 I believe when he had both his tooth root abscess surgeries with Simon, so Floof is still a good age and you’re in the best hands possible. Simon is very good at his job, so I’m confident she will wake up and recover well :) I imagine she’ll probably feel better pretty quickly following the procedure too. Will be thinking of you and the lovely Floof tomorrow, good luck and try not to worry too much - even though that’s impossible!
 
Simon is one of the best surgeons in the country, I have never had any problems with anaesthetics/post surgery issues with any of my piggies. She is with the best vet in my opinion, Hope it goes really well x
 
Thanks, everyone. It's so difficult to know what to do sometimes and I'm genuinely grateful to you all for taking the time to talk to me and offer support and suggestions. I do like to gather as much information as possible and you've all been incredibly helpful. ❤

Floof is doing OK after her check up. Simon trimmed the possible spurs which Kim mentioned two weeks ago and Floof manage to eat some lettuce last night. 🤔
It's really odd. I think the spurs which wouldn't ordinarily be a problem yet are on the same side where the swelling has started (although they don't appear to have caused it) so I think they must have been aggravating the abscess because she couldn't eat lettuce over the last week but she can now! At least she can have something other than just critical care before her big day.
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
Simon has done very many tricky surgeries on our sanctuary piggies, with great success! Floof will be in excellent hands! xx
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Thanks, Debbie. I'm hopeful she'll make it through the op. I think I'm more nervous about the required aftercare and messing it up! I just need to be grateful we're even in this position though because her previous abscess, if it hadn't resolved with the Zithromax, was going to need monthly draining under GA because it wasn't possible to leave it open for cleaning but this one is right under her jaw. It's daft, when I've been syringe feeding her I did keep saying to my partner that it felt bulky and warm but I thought the heat was from me having to handle her mouth regularly to get the syringe in her chops! And I thought the bulky facial structure was down to her shoulder blade issues. 🤦‍♀️
 
Floof made it through the surgery! 🥰

Apparently the abscess wasn't as big or as pus filled as anticipated, it was actually causing inflammation to the surrounding jaw muscles, so it's no wonder the poor little pumpkin could barely eat. She's responded well to the GA and has just been picked up by my partner. Now she's just got to get a taxi and four trains, then she'll be home for some smooches. 😘

Can anyone please advise on when I should start flushing the wound? We were told tomorrow, but I forgot to ask for a more specific time frame. Tomorrow morning? 24 hours after the op? Tomorrow evening? 🤔
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
Great news! I’m sure she’ll be feeling very much better soon. Start tomorrow morning! xx
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Thanks, Debbie. I'll start blasting saline at the poor girl tomorrow morning. Just keen to see if she can eat or not too. I've been syringe feeding for two weeks and I'm exhausted already. Just a couple more weeks of super alert (read: paranoid) guinea care and I'm hoping she'll be on the mend.
 
She's just got home and she's trying her absolute best. She trotted around rumbling gently and then snuggled herself between the others and is slowly eating the sprinkle of veg and herbs I'd popped in the cage. It's slow going but she's managing a few pieces. I thought she'd go and hide, sulking, so I'm pleasantly surprised. (The bigger leaves are to distract the other bottomless pits and I've cut some of each veg into tiny mouthfuls.) Bean, the black teddy, is currently inspecting the wound as she's the designated cage groomer and Floof is grooming herself as best she can.

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Floof is happily pottering around. In fact, whenever I've been to check on them she's always the one out and about. She's had about 35ml CC since last night, some parsley, aubergine, mint and a spinach leaf. At the moment I'm just trying to tempt her with anything and everything in moderation. She's eating hay and pellets too.

We've had a look at the wound and blasted it with some saline but it's really not what I expected. Online a lot of videos show abscess care as something totally different. They lance the lump, squeeze out the pus, pump saline back into the lump/sack and squeeze all that out. Rinse and repeat. Does the Marsupialisation of the wound require different care? Nothing is coming out. I anticipated it would be all leaky, gooey, smelly and gross but it wasn't even damp this morning and she doesn't smell. We lifted her head and blasted three rounds of saline at the incision site where we could see some transparent, dissolvable stitches and that was it. Nothing seemed to flush out from anywhere. No blood or pus on the towel below her. I'm worried that I'm missing something. She's just covered in saline. I patted a saline soaked cotton wool pad on the site and it was very slightly pink with blood but not much at all.
 
That sounds fine. When Pepper had his operation we never got any pus out. But I still flushed it three times a day for two weeks. If a scab forms pick it off. Pepper used to actually enjoy me putting a hanky over a cotton bud and putting it in the hole and twisting it around. It didn’t seem sore at all.

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Good luck. Sounds all good at the moment.
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
That all sounds good! Simon will have flushed out any build up of pus, so just keep it nice and clean!
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So, just blasting saline at the wound should be enough? I'm just not seeing it as deep enough or "pocketed" enough for it to actually collect anything. Saline or pus! Because the abscess nor swelling was particularly large, there's not a huge excess of skin or anything so it's like I'm squirting saline at a flat surface with a cut on it.

weepweeps said:
That sounds fine. When Pepper had his operation we never got any pus out. But I still flushed it three times a day for two weeks. If a scab forms pick it off. Pepper used to actually enjoy me putting a hanky over a cotton bud and putting it in the hole and twisting it around. It didn’t seem sore at all.

View attachment 224018

Good luck. Sounds all good at the moment.
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Nobody told us to pick off any scabs. We were told to take her back in 5/6 days to see if it's scabbed or not. 🤔 For your piggy, it looks like you can put the syringe nozzle directly in the wound "pocket"? Floof's wound doesn't seem to have any depth.
 
Could the fact that Floof's abscess was under the facial muscles, instead of on top of them, be making this a bit different? Simon did say that he'd have to move some of her facial muscles around to actually reach the pus site.
 
weepweeps said:
Peppers was quite deep and a hole rather than a cut.

Did Simon say how to clean it?
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The nurse advised how to clean it, advised directly by Simon afaik.
We were given a bag of saline and 4 syringes, 4 needle tops to go on them, and told to just aim the needle point at the wound and firmly blast it. Floof has a slight skin fold just above the incision site, so I just pull her skin a fraction of a centimetre to flatten it out and we just drench the poor thing, being as firm as possible with the syringe plunger.
 
Ps - Sorry I'm being such a pain in the bum. Floof's been through so much over the last three months and we've spent £1500+ on her care during that time, so we're determined to get this done right. It's just a very unknown situation for us.
 
Brilliant. Sounds like you are doing a great job. I would try and keep it open though so it can drain if it needs to.
 
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