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Heart Problem

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Debedee

Debedee

Junior Guinea Pig
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My little old Teddy (7yrs) has just started on fortekor and frusemide for a suspected heart problem,we are just waiting for an appointment with the cardiologist so he can have a scan to get a clearer picture of what's going on.

I was just wondering if anyone has had any experience of treating heart problems on here?


ps. Teddy knows he's an old boy but was hoping all his piggie friends would keep their little toes crossed for him.:...
 
wow what a superb age, bless him.

I have had a pig with heart problems but i can not give you any advice as i dont feel i know enough to do that, but you will get some sound advice on here.

Good luck with him, my two and my two dogs have their paws crossed x
 
Sorry to hear that Teddy has been unwell. Thankfully it sounds like you're fortunate enough to have access to good vets, so hopefully you can find out what's causing Teddy's issues and find an effective treatment plan soon.

I've heard of a few people on here with "heart pigs" so I'm sure you'll get great advice.

Laura-CCC4's gorgeous little Gwenivere has a thread which might be useful:
http://www.theguineapigforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=44881&highlight=gwenivere

Laura also gave a basic summary of the different heart meds, on a different thread, recently:
http://www.theguineapigforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=54250&page=3

Best of luck x
 
Sorry to hear Teddy has a heart problem Deb, I am pleased what are his particular symptoms?

For so long I put Gwen's symptoms down to little 'quirks', character based behaviour rather than medical symptoms. As you can see from Gwen's thread, she had a lot going on. Only now that she's pretty stable I can see how unwell she was, her meds certainly saved her. She is on the same as your Teddy, Fortekor = benazepril. She had been off the Furosemide for a while but relied very much on it in the first few months.

Pebble is another member with experience and knowledge of heart problems in guinea pigs.
 
Hi

Heart problems are not always a big issue and don't always need any treatment, one of ours has a leaky heart valve and has had it all his life and he is now nearly 6. He occasionaly has a dose of frusemide if he gets a bit congested, but other than that he does fine.

Regards

SGP
 
Hi Laura,
Teddy's abdomen was a little swollen/bloated and his breathing was quite laboured when I got home from work last week. I took him to work and we xrayed him and found that we couldn't get a clear picture of his chest.So he was put on baytril, fusemide and we gave him a steroid shot.
I wasn't certain on how best to continue so I got him checked out by Molly Varga(exotics vet),and she put him on the fruse+fortekor and advised we get a scan of his heart. His thyroid gland is palpable also.

Teddy's off for his scan tomorrow afternoon.:...
 
My Wilbur pig has had a heart problem for over a year now and is doing really well on 0.1ml Dimazon injection daily :)
 
Heart problems are not always a big issue and don't always need any treatment, one of ours has a leaky heart valve and has had it all his life and he is now nearly 6. He occasionally has a dose of frusemide if he gets a bit congested. But other does are fine.
 
Hi all thanks so much for all your thoughts for Teddy.

We did the scan yesterday and it confirmed that Teddy has dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM),which means his heart muscle doesn't contract properly (for Teddy its his left ventricle),so it becomes thin and weaker which basically leads to congestive heart failure. He's also got pleural effusion(fluid) in the chest.

It was a bit touch and go at one point when I thought he'd stopped breathing under the anaesthetic but thankfully he came round and seems to be doing ok today- he's munched all his morning veggies anyway!

I've got to keep Teddy on the Frusemide and Fortekor(benazepril) and also Vetmedin(pimobendan), which he seems quite happy to take so far.

Thanks again everyone for thinking of Teddy x:)
 
Excellent news that you have a diagnosis and the right treatment. I do love a good outcome, obviously this isn't the outcome per se, but you can't ask for better so far!

Which vet did you use?
 
Excellent news that you have a diagnosis and the right treatment. I do love a good outcome, obviously this isn't the outcome per se, but you can't ask for better so far!

Which vet did you use?
 
Laura-CCC4 said:
Excellent news that you have a diagnosis and the right treatment. I do love a good outcome, obviously this isn't the outcome per se, but you can't ask for better so far!

Which vet did you use?
Click to expand...

It's good that now I know what I'm dealing with for Ted.

Ted's initial xrays etc were done at my practice and then we decided to get another opinion from Molly Varga who's an exotic specialist vet. She thought that Ted could have DCM and suggested the scan. Luckily the vet cardiologist (Mike Holgate) is a good friend of mine so that's how I got Ted seen so quickly.
So he's on the fortekor once daily, vetmedin twice and frusemide 3 times daily, unfortunately they only make meaty flavoured fortekor+vetmedin now so I'm trying to disguise the flavour with ribena.:)
It's just a case of monitoring his progress now and I'll probably take him back to see Molly in a few weeks for a check up.
 
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