E. Cuniculi

[Willow819]

I wanted to share my little pigs story in case it may help someone else. Back in December, she started to have issues where she would cough when eating and had lost weight. We treated her for infections and had many vet appointments. In February, food started to come out her nose when she ate. We did blood work, X-rays, scopes of her mouth and teeth,and a CT scan that all came back fine. Vet started her on reglan and sucrulfate and flushed her nose during the CT scan while we waited for more results. The e. Cuniculi test came back positive. The disease caused damage to the nerve that helps with swallowing. 10 days on panacur she had nystagmus, was clumsy (back leg looked weak) and she would shake her head. We stopped thinking it may be disease die off causing inflammation. the neuro symptoms stopped after 2 days. We restarted the panacur 5 days later and did it for 5 days and she had difficulty with walking and seemed off. Five days later I gave her another dose of the panacur and we saw her experienced vet. He said to stop the panacur and just do meloxicam, reglan and sucrulfate.

She has done ok with a lot of ups and downs but is happy. With the current combo of medicine, she still at times has food out the nose but nothing like before and we have to watch what textures of food we give her. Peppers have to be cut up small, cucumbers cut up with no mushy middle parts, etc. she can eat lettuce fine and harder stuff. She is on and off about hay but loves hay treats.

So little is known about e. Cuniculi so if your piggy is having issues with swallowing and the teeth are fine or if food is coming out the nose I would recommend asking your vet to test for e cuniculi, prescribe reglan and give meloxicam.

 

[Eriathwen]

Aw I've had/have several piggies now with E.cuniculi, I'm sorry your piggy is dealing with this. My first EC pig was reliant almost exclusively on syringe feeding for months to start with due to the nerve damage in her face causing her to struggle to chew and swallow, but luckily over time this repaired itself..I hope the same is said for yours!
One of my current ones is dealing with hind leg weakness, but at almost 9 years old with bad arthritis she's still getting around pretty well, considering! And only has another 4 days left of her panacur course. She's had EC for at least 5 years now, so doing well.
Fingers crossed for a long, happy and as normal a life as possible for your little girl.

 

[Willow819]

Out of curiosity, how long did the vet have you give the panacur? Was it a once and done thing or did you/ do you have to give it periodically? The vets here in San Diego have never seen a pig with e cuniculu so we are kind of “winging it” with how to treat this. That is so encouraging that the nerve repaired itself! Thanks so much for sharing all of this. This is a picture of my little lovey.

 

[Eriathwen]

Aw shes beautiful! I was told once a day for 28 days when symptoms show, which I believe is the same course rabbits get too. We also had one who was effected quite severely and we were told to continue past the usual 28 days for as long as symptoms improved, until they plateaued and we found her new "normal".

And you're welcome! Until I had one diagnosed with it I'd never even heard of it so it's definitely been quite a learning curve over the years.

 

[Wiebke]

I wanted to share my little pigs story in case it may help someone else. Back in December, she started to have issues where she would cough when eating and had lost weight. We treated her for infections and had many vet appointments. In February, food started to come out her nose when she ate. We did blood work, X-rays, scopes of her mouth and teeth,and a CT scan that all came back fine. Vet started her on reglan and sucrulfate and flushed her nose during the CT scan while we waited for more results. The e. Cuniculi test came back positive. The disease caused damage to the nerve that helps with swallowing. 10 days on panacur she had nystagmus, was clumsy (back leg looked weak) and she would shake her head. We stopped thinking it may be disease die off causing inflammation. the neuro symptoms stopped after 2 days. We restarted the panacur 5 days later and did it for 5 days and she had difficulty with walking and seemed off. Five days later I gave her another dose of the panacur and we saw her experienced vet. He said to stop the panacur and just do meloxicam, reglan and sucrulfate.

She has done ok with a lot of ups and downs but is happy. With the current combo of medicine, she still at times has food out the nose but nothing like before and we have to watch what textures of food we give her. Peppers have to be cut up small, cucumbers cut up with no mushy middle parts, etc. she can eat lettuce fine and harder stuff. She is on and off about hay but loves hay treats.

So little is known about e. Cuniculi so if your piggy is having issues with swallowing and the teeth are fine or if food is coming out the nose I would recommend asking your vet to test for e cuniculi, prescribe reglan and give meloxicam.

Hi

Thank you for sharing your experience. I am very sorry that your guinea pig did have e.cuniculi and that they did have an adverse reaction to panacur; it is the first case of the latter we are coming across in nearly 20 years of our forum existence.

Do you have rabbits as well or know whether your guinea pig has been living with or close to rabbits at some point where debris from used dishes could have fallen into their cages or into their bowls during feeding time as an indirect but proven route of transmission?

We do have some information about e.cuniculi in this guide about neurological issues (at least what little there is) here. Unfortunately, guinea pigs are still dreadfully under-researched as a fairly common pet species; they also fall very much into the gap between being classed as an exotics species togther with all other rodent pets but all too often considered too pedestrian for the real exotics buffs. The lack of research is especially noticeable when it comes to any form neurological aspects where it is near total.
At least improved diagnostics are slowly filtering down to guinea pigs and there is now some research done into guinea pigs but we have are still decades behind other species.
CBS (Calcified Bulla Syndrome) and Neurological Problems - Symptoms and Care

 

[Willow819]

Thank you for sharing this information. I got my little piggy from the local rescue back in 2021. She was around a year old and came from a shelter in the Los Angels area. Ever since I have had her, she has not been around any other animals except guinea pigs.

It started off with a cough here and there and weight loss. We thought maybe she was eating too quick and the new friend in the herd (she lived with 4 others and I introduced one I had since she was a baby whose mate died into the herd) was eating all the food. After a few weeks we tried prednisone and Zithromax thinking maybe there was an infection. In January, she started coughing more when eating but only certain soft textures. In February she had what we think was a URI. She had a round of antibiotics (Baytril with doxy added shortly after) and seemed to get completely better. A week off of those she started to having symptoms again of coughing and then started sneezing which progressed to food coming out the nose. We did blood work and a CT scan and scoped her mouth and everything was normal. Vets were perplexed so we ran the e cuniculi just to see and it came back positive.

Prior to panacur she had zero neurological symptoms. After 10 doses 1.3ml I believe, she got horizontal nystagmus, shook like a dog does to get dry, had a slight head tilt, and back left leg was a bit weaker causing her to fall over. We gave mezcaline (may have spelled that wrong), kept her on the sucrulfate and reglan and stopped panache. Symptoms cleared in 2 days but she was still having the coughing and getting stuffy after eating food. After 5 days we restarted and after five days the wobbliness when walking and being clumsy came back. We stopped it again and the vet decided to add meloxicam.

We went back to her original vet last Monday and he upped the meloxicam to twice a day. She mostly has good days but Sundays she seems off and not interested in hay (so weird bc it’s been the last two Sundays and then Monday she is fine). At this point we are waiting on new blood test titers for e cunicul (last only gave positive result and not numbers) and a during dna test to see if she is shedding spores. Her exotic vet with 40+ years experience thinks the disease is gone and what we have left is inflammation. Her only issue now besides the stuffy and coughing on food is her weight. Been trying everything to get it up but can’t give critical care or recovery food because she chokes on the texture. It’s been exhausting but she is worth it.

I appreciate everyone sharing as we are in uncharted territory over here in San Diego.

 

[Wiebke]

Thank you for sharing this information. I got my little piggy from the local rescue back in 2021. She was around a year old and came from a shelter in the Los Angels area. Ever since I have had her, she has not been around any other animals except guinea pigs.

It started off with a cough here and there and weight loss. We thought maybe she was eating too quick and the new friend in the herd (she lived with 4 others and I introduced one I had since she was a baby whose mate died into the herd) was eating all the food. After a few weeks we tried prednisone and Zithromax thinking maybe there was an infection. In January, she started coughing more when eating but only certain soft textures. In February she had what we think was a URI. She had a round of antibiotics (Baytril with doxy added shortly after) and seemed to get completely better. A week off of those she started to having symptoms again of coughing and then started sneezing which progressed to food coming out the nose. We did blood work and a CT scan and scoped her mouth and everything was normal. Vets were perplexed so we ran the e cuniculi just to see and it came back positive.

Prior to panacur she had zero neurological symptoms. After 10 doses 1.3ml I believe, she got horizontal nystagmus, shook like a dog does to get dry, had a slight head tilt, and back left leg was a bit weaker causing her to fall over. We gave mezcaline (may have spelled that wrong), kept her on the sucrulfate and reglan and stopped panache. Symptoms cleared in 2 days but she was still having the coughing and getting stuffy after eating food. After 5 days we restarted and after five days the wobbliness when walking and being clumsy came back. We stopped it again and the vet decided to add meloxicam.

We went back to her original vet last Monday and he upped the meloxicam to twice a day. She mostly has good days but Sundays she seems off and not interested in hay (so weird bc it’s been the last two Sundays and then Monday she is fine). At this point we are waiting on new blood test titers for e cunicul (last only gave positive result and not numbers) and a during dna test to see if she is shedding spores. Her exotic vet with 40+ years experience thinks the disease is gone and what we have left is inflammation. Her only issue now besides the stuffy and coughing on food is her weight. Been trying everything to get it up but can’t give critical care or recovery food because she chokes on the texture. It’s been exhausting but she is worth it.

I appreciate everyone sharing as we are in uncharted territory over here in San Diego.

Can you get emeraid recovery products in the US? They are much more finely ground and in my own experience do go down better with the piggies that really struggle to eat. Especially if you make them up a bit more loosely. You need to feed more in order to make up the fibre and calories but you are quite obviously in a situation where whatever works is key...

Are you on cat (0.5mg) or dog (1.5 mg) strength metacm and on which dosage for what weight? Metacam is an anti-inflammatory as well as a painkiller.

 

[Willow819]

She is on the 1.5mg of metacam. The first vet said .7 but her original vet said I can go up to 2 but I have found that 1.1 is what works best. Her weight varies from 560 to 600.grams. She is always willing to eat veggies and 75% of the time hay but won’t eat her pellets except on a rare occasion. She loves the oxbow Timothy treats that are Cheerio shaped and the small pet select healthy smackers blueberry and pear. The reglan is what is helping the food not come out the nose. We missed a dose (my misunderstanding of its purpose) and the difficulty swallowing got worse. There seems to be no pattern really of what triggers her not to feel well other than the past two Sundays she has been pretty off.

I will have to look into emerald recovery and if we can get it here. She also have sores on her feet that we are treating. They are from her sitting a lot when she was not feeling well at all. She is never on wet surfaces and silvadeen and Lucas pawpaw cream seem to be helping. The vet wanted me to put bandaids on it but she goes bonkers and tries to chew them off so that didn’t work the two times I tried it.

 

[Wiebke]

She is on the 1.5mg of metacam. The first vet said .7 but her original vet said I can go up to 2 but I have found that 1.1 is what works best. Her weight varies from 560 to 600.grams. She is always willing to eat veggies and 75% of the time hay but won’t eat her pellets except on a rare occasion. She loves the oxbow Timothy treats that are Cheerio shaped and the small pet select healthy smackers blueberry and pear. The reglan is what is helping the food not come out the nose. We missed a dose (my misunderstanding of its purpose) and the difficulty swallowing got worse. There seems to be no pattern really of what triggers her not to feel well other than the past two Sundays she has been pretty off.

I will have to look into emerald recovery and if we can get it here. She also have sores on her feet that we are treating. They are from her sitting a lot when she was not feeling well at all. She is never on wet surfaces and silvadeen and Lucas pawpaw cream seem to be helping. The vet wanted me to put bandaids on it but she goes bonkers and tries to chew them off so that didn’t work the two times I tried it.

Good that she is on maxed out metacam. Your vet knows their stuff. It is all to often dosed too low so we like to check.

Here are our tips for looking after guinea pigs with mobility issues - which includes very ill piggies.
@Viennese Furbabies may be the best to help you with the foot care as she has been battling severe bumblefoot.

 

[Willow819]

Thanks much! Will check it out! I really appreciate all the advice. I think e cuniculi is more common here than they think but they just always think it’s ear and never go beyond that when the piggies don’t get better. They were hesitant to even check at the one vet but her original vet suggested this as a possibility back in January. Not sure why he didn’t test at that point and I didn’t have the knowledge then to push for it. I was pretty convinced there was an oral nasal fistula until CT and scope ruled that out. It’s definitely been a journey!

 

[Wiebke]

Thanks much! Will check it out! I really appreciate all the advice. I think e cuniculi is more common here than they think but they just always think it’s ear and never go beyond that when the piggies don’t get better. They were hesitant to even check at the one vet but her original vet suggested this as a possibility back in January. Not sure why he didn’t test at that point and I didn’t have the knowledge then to push for it. I was pretty convinced there was an oral nasal fistula until CT and scope ruled that out. It’s definitely been a journey!

Here in the UK on this forum we are most commonly confronted with a respiratory infection that goes into the ear and brain scenario. That is when alarm bells are ringing - even more so if rabbits are also kept on the premises and are living together (which they no longer should) or if they are fed at the same time.

A forum member discovered the transmission angle via infected food dishes when it happened to them - but that scenario can also easily apply to feeding practices at shelters and backstore pet shops when bowls are taken out and stacked, and infected debris can get into full dishes or pens.

 

[Willow819]

Have you all had any incidents where it was transmitted from Guinea pig to Guinea pig? Before we knew about it, my little one lived with a herd of 4 others. None of them are ill thankfully. She is now on her own and visits them on occasion for short periods of time. Her main issue at this point is coughing when eating. I just have to cut stuff up really small. I’m waiting on results of titers and urine this week to see what is what.

 

[Viennese Furbabies]

I had one guinea pig that was tested positive a few years ago. Her partner never developed any symptoms. After his death, she moved into my larger group and none of these piggies developed symptoms either.
In continental Europe, E. Cuniculi is widespread among rabbits but not all develop symptoms. Very little is known about it in guinea pigs. The specialist vet at the university of veterinary medicine in Vienna always says that there are no validated publications on this subject and the test used in guinea pigs is only validated for rabbits.

I treated my girl with panacur for many weeks the first time around (also with antibiotics because she had a URI as well as a head tilt and nystagmus) and she got it every few weeks for a few days during the first year. But it was mostly trial and error on my part.
We later found that her head tilt had been cause by an ear infection. So I can't say if her symptoms were related to E. Cuniculi or if her positive test was just a coincidence. But I always had the feeling that the repeated treatment with panacur did her a lot of good.

 

[Willow819]

Thanks for sharing. The past few days she has been not feeling well at all and more hesitant to eat. She has a stuffy nose from food coming out her nose so I started her on antibiotics and plan to call the vet. This has been a rough road. Everytime I think she is on the up swing she gets knocked down by something else.

 

[Willow819]

Another one of my piggies was diagnosed with e cuniculi. It’s a piggy that has never been near the first one diagnosed. This one has renal issues. I took her in bc she was drinking a lot of water. They tested her and it was positive. Does anyone know where humans can get a titer test for this? I’m America it seems impossible. I spent 6 hours calling and searching. I know it’s rare in humans but I have had some weird bronchitis that has not responded to 5 rounds of antibiotics and the vet thinks it’s plausible that I got it from the piggies. My doctor refuses to test despite all of this.

 

[Viennese Furbabies]

I'm sorry, I don't have any advice for you. But as far as I know it's only dangerous if you have got an immunodeficiency.

 

[Willow819]

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone for the advice on the e cuniculi. Both of the piggies despite treatment passed =(

The one had it for 7 months and just kept getting thinner and thinner despite eating a lot. She had such a will to live but her body just gave out. The other one only had it for a few months and after treatment with panacur seemed to be doing well with water consumption going back to normal. I think she died of kidney/ organ failure because her back legs went limp and she had no bladder control and passed pretty quickly. It’s such a cruel and heart breaking disease. Their vet wanted to do necropsies on both to learn more since it’s not well diagnosed in the states but we were traveling at the time and not near our vet. Thanks again for everyone’s help.

 

[Wiebke]

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone for the advice on the e cuniculi. Both of the piggies despite treatment passed =(

The one had it for 7 months and just kept getting thinner and thinner despite eating a lot. She had such a will to live but her body just gave out. The other one only had it for a few months and after treatment with panacur seemed to be doing well with water consumption going back to normal. I think she died of kidney/ organ failure because her back legs went limp and she had no bladder control and passed pretty quickly. It’s such a cruel and heart breaking disease. Their vet wanted to do necropsies on both to learn more since it’s not well diagnosed in the states but we were traveling at the time and not near our vet. Thanks again for everyone’s help.

BIG HUGS

I am so very sorry. You have done your very best and have bought some extra life time; it is not your fault.

E.cuniculi often goes undetected/misdiagnosed even over here in Europe where it does happen more often because rabbits and guinea pigs are still kept together or in close proximity. But getting as far as you have got very much against the odds speaks for your devotion and persistence as an owner. Be sad but proud of yourself.

 

[Viennese Furbabies]

I'm very sorry for your loss!

 

[A Guinea Pig]

I'm so sorry you lost her. May she rest peacefully.