Gastrointestinal hypomotility and stasis !?

[Hans123456789]

Hi, I have 2 guinea pigs, Lima and Leyla. Leyla is always healthy as a fiddle, she is a very crazy guinea pig, often she can't stand in one place for a minute. But Lima, she's such a snuggly, lazy, greedy guinea pig. That wouldn't be a problem, but she's always sick, she recently overcame a "bladder sludge" (I don't know if that's exactly it, in slovak it's literally "sand in the bladder"). Because of this I have adjusted their diet ( unlimited timothy hay, they each get 70-90g of veggies: every day they get gem lettuce, parsley leaves, green pepper, celery, and every second/third day I also give them a piece of carrot, sometimes i can buy some other vegetables or herbs in the local shop, but that's not very common + 1-2 tablespoons each of versele laga cavia complete pellets, I know it's too much but Lima can't live without pellets ),.

However, in the long term I notice another problem with Lima, she is prone to bloat (she has suffered from it 2x in the last 2 years and last time she had bloat even though she didn't eat much veggies), and a couple of times a year her belly hurts a lot. I'll try to describe exactly what happened a few days ago:

They got to eat at 8:00 AM then I wasn't home and they didn't get to eat until 2: 00 PM (20-25g gem lettuce, green peppers, celery, perachine vnat), then they weren't hungry until 8 PM when I thought it was weird and gave them food ( they got the same thing again as before), leyla jumped up and started eating normally, but Lima, she jumped up, her belly was so low she was dragging it on the ground and it was very very soft, but her behavior was normal, she ate normally and I thought her belly was just sore from hunger, right after eating she crawled back in the house and lay down, I knew something was wrong so I tried to call her for an apple, she jumped up again normally and came to me, still dragging her belly on the ground (her appetite never changes because she's a very greedy guinea pig). The more she moved, the more her belly hurt, so I laid her down on the bed and watched what was going on, she couldn't even lie down from the pain and kept rolling over. I immediately gave her a warm compress and started massaging her belly, after an hour I could see she was feeling better. Her belly was no longer dragging on the ground but was very very soft, she was in that state all night afterwards. I checked her every hour and every 2 hours I massaged her belly and gave her a warm compress. In the morning everything was fine again. This situation happens several times a year.

I don't know why this is happening to her, the only thing I was told when she was at the vet so long ago because of bloat was that she has restricted bowel movement, I found the term "digestive tract hypomobility and stasis", if I understood correctly this is a disease in which the bowels stop moving and as a result gas forms in the bowel. I was thinking if the fact that she had 2x bloat is also related to this disease. But I'm still so uncertain about it, and I still don't know what and how. That's why I'm writing here for help on what you think.

 

[Piggies&buns]

Please ensure you switch from the routine weekly weight checks and instead weigh daily while she is unwell.
A piggy constantly needs to be eating hay for the guts to function properly. You will need to step in and replace the hay intake with syringe feeding a fibre rich recovery feed or mushed pellets during an episode to ensure her guts don’t stop (ie stasis). The daily weight checks are essential to make sure you are getting enough syringe feed into her in each 24 hour period.

This guides below give details about bloat and stasis and the importance of syringe feeding

Digestive Disorders: Diarrhea - Bloat - GI Stasis (No Gut Movement) And Not Eating
All About Syringe Feeding and Medicating Guinea Pigs with Videos and Pictures

A few other things. Parsley is high calcium so shoud not be fed every day - it should only be given once a week. Carrot should also be given much less frequently - no more than once a week as it is too high in sugar and co tribute to the overgrowth of the wrong wrong type of bacteria and cause gut problems.
Please do cut the pellets down to just one tablespoon each . They are high in calcium and this is what contributes to the bladder sludge. The less pellets they eat, the more hay they eat and the healthier they will be.

Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets

 

[Wiebke]

Hi and welcome

There is not a huge lot you can do with ongoing bowel problems in guinea pigs as there is not a lot in really effective medication; our practical tips and advice are in the digestive problems thread.
Gut problems can be either caused by a problem inside the gut or by pressure on/pain radiating into gut. With longer term problems there is often another underlying problem or frailness/genetic disposition in play in my own experience even if you are unable to put the finger on it; especially when problems remain in the wake of a GI stasis (the gut stopping). Slow gut movement (hypomotility) is one such issue.

What you can do is ensure that your piggy eats as much hay as possible. Please cut back on pellets (just 1 tablespoon per day), which are mostly filler and very little real fibre (even the timothy based ones); leave out all grain/corn, root veg and fruit because these food groups can all contribute to dysbiosis, i.e. the overgrowth of the wrong kind of digestive bacteria, which can cause gassing and/or diarrhea. They are all food groups that wouldn't have featured much in the diet grass/hay fibre based diet guinea pigs have evolved on, from the digestive process to the grow rate of the important grinding molars against the very abrasive silica in grass/hay fibre.

Keep in mind that veg and pellets together replace the supplementary role of wild forage in the original diet and should together only make about a quarter at most of what your piggy eats.
We do have a chapter in our diet with advice on guinea pigs with longer term digestive issues but you may want to read the whole guide so you can understand better how a guinea pig diet works to help your piggy as best as you can.
Here is the link again: Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets

All the best.