• Discussions taking place within this forum are intended for the purpose of assisting you in discussing options with your vet. Any other use of advice given here is done so at your risk, is solely your responsibility and not that of this forum or its owner. Before posting it is your responsibility you abide by this Statement

GI Stasis - Positive stories?

RheMae

RheMae

Junior Guinea Pig
Joined
Dec 23, 2022
Messages
51
Reaction score
41
Points
220
Location
Lincoln Park Michigan
Hi all. I just would like some positive outcomes please.
I stayed up all night with my guinea pig Guts. He was diagnosed yesterday with GI stasis and bloat. Once home, I gave him vibrating tummy rubs every 3 hours or so, made sure he had some floor time. No veg, and tried my hardest many times to syringe feed him CC and mushed pellets and water.
I managed to get only about 5 ml of CC in him, and about 1 ml of mushed pellets.
Around 3 am he seemed to be hurting again and I couldn't take it. He wasn't due for more pain meds until 12 more hours, and he could barely move. Just puffed up, and shifting from side to side, grinding his teeth loudly. And even worse, he started drooling, and the drool smelled bad. I just worried I did it with his last tummy rub, and I was worried his tummy had flipped.
So we took him to emergency, and they're keeping him now for a bit to do injectables. I told them everything, many times, and I'm trying to advocate for him. They said his insides still aren't moving, and due to advice in this thread, I did ask about both GI meds since the vet only gave him one. And I pushed for more pain relief. And more X-rays.
They said on his X-rays again, that his teeth look fine and I feel crazy at this point. I'm just terrified, I just lost another guinea Judo a few days ago, after taking him to this same emergency. But I didn't know what I know now, and it's the only one in the area that will do exotics. Especially in a blizzard.

Long story short, has anybody had a guinea pig with GI stasis and bloat that was hospitalized and bounced back? I just want him back again. And if I won't have him back, I want to prepare best I can.
 
I can’t offer any experience but want to assure you of support.
I am holding you in my heart at this difficult time. ♥️
 
Prayers and wishes to Guts! ❤️
We rehomed a piggy called Jakob years ago from the rescue who gets recurring bloat. He is 6 now, on long term pain relief for arthritis and gut stimulants long term for his bloat issues too and is doing great (albeit on a limited diet!)
 
Wheekallweek said:
Prayers and wishes to Guts! ❤️
We rehomed a piggy called Jakob years ago from the rescue who gets recurring bloat. He is 6 now, on long term pain relief for arthritis and gut stimulants long term for his bloat issues too and is doing great (albeit on a limited diet!)
Click to expand...
Oh my gosh this brought me to tears. You never hear of a lot of good stories, so I'm hoping my heart away! I'll definitely be looking into his diet and seeing what he may be sensitive to! Thank you bunches.
 
My pleasure! The only thing Jakob can eat was lots of hay, grain free nuggets, grass and red pepper. He seems quite happy with that and his new family absolutely adore him. He still comes over for his holibobs when they go away 😊

We also had a piggy in called Tina (one of the very first at the rescue) who used to dramatically bloat for no apparent reason. It turns out she had a grain allergy and also a bad reaction to... grass lol 🤦‍♀️
She improved massively on grain free nuggets, who knows if this might help Guts? I really hope he pulls through x
 
Wheekallweek said:
My pleasure! The only thing Jakob can eat was lots of hay, grain free nuggets, grass and red pepper. He seems quite happy with that and his new family absolutely adore him. He still comes over for his holibobs when they go away 😊

We also had a piggy in called Tina (one of the very first at the rescue) who used to dramatically bloat for no apparent reason. It turns out she had a grain allergy and also a bad reaction to... grass lol 🤦‍♀️
She improved massively on grain free nuggets, who knows if this might help Guts? I really hope he pulls through x
Click to expand...
Nothing would make me happier than trying to sort through veg and pellets and such for him, I swear. I got so sad about Judo, and worried I messed up with him, I gave them kale, spinach, cucumber, red leaf lettuce, and dandelion greens (their favorite). He was already reluctant to take food before this, but I just wanted to make sure he was eating, I hadn't done any research yet and now I know that was a bit of a mistake.
And a reaction to grass?! My word, you just never know.
They're complicated little guys, but they sure are the best.
 
Wheekallweek said:
My pleasure! The only thing Jakob can eat was lots of hay, grain free nuggets, grass and red pepper. He seems quite happy with that and his new family absolutely adore him. He still comes over for his holibobs when they go away 😊

We also had a piggy in called Tina (one of the very first at the rescue) who used to dramatically bloat for no apparent reason. It turns out she had a grain allergy and also a bad reaction to... grass lol 🤦‍♀️
She improved massively on grain free nuggets, who knows if this might help Guts? I really hope he pulls through x
Click to expand...
Also I'm writing grain free nuggets down. I'll look into it. There's so much to learn, it never ends!
 
Our piggy Lucy became very prone to bloat as she got older, and honestly there were a couple of times I thought we were going to loose her for sure.
We also took quite a few late night trips to the emergency vet, but she always rallied.
In the end we put her on a super basic diet of just hay and a few grain free nuggets for a month and then started to introduce a small amount of each new food at a time - this really helped to pinpoint things that seemed to specifically cause her bloat to reoccur.
It can be managed, and you have done the absolute best thing by taking him to the vet.
 
RheMae said:
Hi all. I just would like some positive outcomes please.
I stayed up all night with my guinea pig Guts. He was diagnosed yesterday with GI stasis and bloat. Once home, I gave him vibrating tummy rubs every 3 hours or so, made sure he had some floor time. No veg, and tried my hardest many times to syringe feed him CC and mushed pellets and water.
I managed to get only about 5 ml of CC in him, and about 1 ml of mushed pellets.
Around 3 am he seemed to be hurting again and I couldn't take it. He wasn't due for more pain meds until 12 more hours, and he could barely move. Just puffed up, and shifting from side to side, grinding his teeth loudly. And even worse, he started drooling, and the drool smelled bad. I just worried I did it with his last tummy rub, and I was worried his tummy had flipped.
So we took him to emergency, and they're keeping him now for a bit to do injectables. I told them everything, many times, and I'm trying to advocate for him. They said his insides still aren't moving, and due to advice in this thread, I did ask about both GI meds since the vet only gave him one. And I pushed for more pain relief. And more X-rays.
They said on his X-rays again, that his teeth look fine and I feel crazy at this point. I'm just terrified, I just lost another guinea Judo a few days ago, after taking him to this same emergency. But I didn't know what I know now, and it's the only one in the area that will do exotics. Especially in a blizzard.

Long story short, has anybody had a guinea pig with GI stasis and bloat that was hospitalized and bounced back? I just want him back again. And if I won't have him back, I want to prepare best I can.
Click to expand...

Hi

I am very sorry. It sounds like you are also dealing with acute bloat and just the gut stopping to work. Sever gut issues are always a battle because there are not magical drugs and guinea pig guts are very thin and very, very long - and proportionally a lot larger than a human gut.

You can find a link to the story of my Pili Pala's GI stasis (happy ending - she lived for nearly another year to nearly 6 years of age) in our practical Care guide with lots of tips, which you may find helpful: Digestive Disorders: Not Eating - Diarrhea - Bloat - GI Stasis (No Gut Movement)

Here is our very comprehensive syringe feeding and medicating guide with all the little tricks and advice, including how much/how often you need to feed - a lot more than you think: All About Syringe Feeding and Medicating Guinea Pigs with Videos and Pictures

Here is the direct link to Pili Pala's story: Please Send Your Vibes To Pili Pala!

Fingers very firmly crossed!
 
Wishing Guts the best of luck with his treatment and recovery.

I can share the story of one of my girls who got bloat:
I fed her lettuce like normal the night before, and in the morning she was a bit quiet and hadn't finished her lettuce ... odd, but I took it away kept an eye on her. (I had a dentist appointment in the early afternoon, so I was home.) Fast forward to a bit after noon, and she's lying on her side clearly miserable. We give the vet a call and fortunately they can take her right away, so we drop her off at the vet, and I head to the dentist. Vet took some radiographs to discover a very bloated tummy and did some vitamin B12 injections into acupuncture points to help her pass the gas (a technique she borrowed from treating egg-bound birds). I'm sure she had her on some pain meds, too, since she was clearly miserable upon arrival. Anyways, while I was still at the dentist, vet called for approval to put my piggy under anaesthesia to extract gas with a needle (we had pre-approved standard stuff ... radiographs, meds, etc., but with the risks of anaesthesia, especially in an ill pig at nearly 6 years old, she was calling make sure); the options at that point were pretty much try the anaesthesia or put to sleep, so we went for it (greatest risk was not waking up ... so may as well try it). Vet put her under general anaesthesia and she immediately made a puddle and poo, which was good (likely a combination of acupuncture injections and her body relaxing under the anaesthesia). Vet used a needle syringe to draw out a ton of gas. (I want to say it was like 22ccs or something, but I may be misremembering that?) My girl was then tucked in a warm cage snuggled with hay to wake up. She woke up, and immediately (to their surprise) started to devour her cuddling hay. The vet normally would have kept her over night and cared for her herself, but the following day was her birthday and she had dinner plans, and it was going into a weekend, so she let us take my piggy home. (We were one of very few owners she would have trusted to take a piggy home in that state.) We got some critical care and instructions (no veggies, no pellets, critical care every 2-3 hours as much as she'll tolerate in a sitting) and were given the odds of survival of "greater than zero." Vet set us up with a follow-up appointment with the exotics vet at a pet hospital that wasn't too horribly far though a tough drive due to being in Boston (specifically Jamaica Plain, if you're familiar with the city). We diligently fed critical care every two hours with one three hour gap overnight (we tag-teamed to allow for some sleep to occur), and she was doing much better. We still took her in for her follow up, bringing along her records and the radiographs from the day before. The vet there took new radiographs and could hardly believes the previous radiographs were the same pig we'd brought in; the improvement was that dramatic. Vet checked her over and determined there was very little likelihood of recurrence, so we could just continue with home care and start weaning her off the critical care, if we wanted, given that she would eat hay on her own, though still no veggies. We widened the spacing on the critical care to 4-5 hours and gave lots of hay, which she devoured. She returned to her normal behavior and we continued to wean off critical care and were able to restart veggies a few days later. She lived another year and a half to two years after the bloat crisis before passing away from old age at just over 7.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top