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IC trouble

Update
The vet took his temperature, gave stuff a feel, did an xray but can’t see anything wrong. He suggested a higher pain relief and said we should add tramadol to the mix. He also asked for us to collect a urine sample and bring it in, he thinks it could be a UTI thats resistant to sulfatrim (the antibiotic he’s on currently). We’re going to get that back to the vets either tomorrow or Monday. Hopefully it comes back as being a UTI, then that can be treated and hopefully everything will be okay. The vet said that the calcification in the urethra is still there but again he wasnt really concerned. I'm kind of concerned though, if it’s not a UTI or another stone then it could be that whatever is going on in the urethra actually is causing a problem and its a problem that I don’t think is possible to fix due to the placement of it. I guess we’ll see what happens.
 
I don't know whether you've been catching George's thread Stone me! George's secret... but we've been trying to unpick a large bladder stone from a stubborn UTI. George is an old boy but he doesn't have any history of IC and got his first stone this summer. It's been the second one that's caused the trouble, but he seems to have had worse pain and more blood in pee from UTI. It was mostly resistant to Baytril so he's now on Sulfatrim - a 10 day course seemed to have cleared it but it came back again after a few days so he's back on it and we're seeing the vet next Monday for a more long term plan. Did you get antibiotics automatically after the surgery? And for how long? We've never had Sulfatrim for less than 10 days and Ivy was notoriously on ABs for nearly 3 weeks and it still wasn't long enough so she was back on them again for another few before she got over it.
 
Free Ranger said:
I don't know whether you've been catching George's thread Stone me! George's secret... but we've been trying to unpick a large bladder stone from a stubborn UTI. George is an old boy but he doesn't have any history of IC and got his first stone this summer. It's been the second one that's caused the trouble, but he seems to have had worse pain and more blood in pee from UTI. It was mostly resistant to Baytril so he's now on Sulfatrim - a 10 day course seemed to have cleared it but it came back again after a few days so he's back on it and we're seeing the vet next Monday for a more long term plan. Did you get antibiotics automatically after the surgery? And for how long? We've never had Sulfatrim for less than 10 days and Ivy was notoriously on ABs for nearly 3 weeks and it still wasn't long enough so she was back on them again for another few before she got over it.
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No I haven’t seen it, I’ll check it out. We didn’t get antibiotics from the vet who did it but we called Ellie the guinea pig specialist the next day who said to give sulfatrim 0.3mls. So he had the op Wednesday at around 2pm and then was given the AB Thursday afternoon. He’s still on them now, tomorrow is ten days post op. Not sure when we’re meant to stop, we were going to give them for 14 days but it depends on what the urine sample brings us back. I’m hoping so badly that this is just a stubborn uti that some Baytril will solve
 
The mood here today is pretty low. When giving him his medicine this morning, BB had a painful pee which, again, had blood. This is the first painful pee we’ve witnessed as it was just the poops before causing him pain. We’re assuming the worst case scenario. He’s pretty subdued, he’ll eat his hay for a couple of minutes if I wake him up and shoo him out of his hidey, so we’re mainly just syringe feeding him. It’s just hard listening to him being in pain
 
Update:
There’s quite a lot to say today.
Yesterday, we had an appointment with the vet. She removed his external stitches as the wound had completely healed. She took a pee sample which we’re sending off to be cultured. She didn’t want to do another X-ray as one was done on Friday and it came back clear, but I insisted anyway. The X-ray showed more stones, not proper stones but around 5 small stone fragments. The vet said he could even pass them himself. I mentioned the calcification in the urethra and the vet said that actually it looked like it was in the bowel area and not the urethra. The vet wasn’t keen on doing another surgery but said we could do a bladder flush on Thursday to see if we can flush the small stones out. The line of thought was that if these stones don’t come out then we euthanise. In the meantime, we were given baytril to give him. We were told to give that alongside the sulfatrim however the sulfatrim isn’t doing anything and he’s on a lot of meds so we’ve decided to stop it in favour of just giving the baytril. The meds he’s on are 1ml loxicom, 0.3ml gabapentin, 0.2ml tramadol, 0.4ml emeprid, 0.15ml cisapride, 0.4ml baytril, half a tablet of cystophan and then fibreplex. So he’s on a lot of stuff.
For peace of mind, I had a phone consultation with Simon yesterday night to get a second opinion. He pretty much disagreed with everything from the appointment. He said the stones in the bladder should not be causing this level of pain and so he thinks there’s something else going on. He still thinks this calcification is definitely in the urethra and isn’t sure whether it’s a backing up of little stones. He thinks a bladder flush would be a bad idea as since the bladder wound is so fresh, it could easily do damage or even tear, unless the bladder flush was done gently but in that case the stones probably wouldn’t even flush. He also said that by doing the flush, you risk the area in the urethra becoming worse, that if it is a backing up of little stones then by flushing you could cause a blockage. He told me that the best thing to do would be to give it time and manage the pain - that’s the main thing. If we can get on top of the pain, then we should give it as long as we can. I provisionally booked an appointment with Simon on the 30th November, that will be 4 weeks post op for BB.
Following this conversation, I don’t think the bladder flush would be wise at this stage, it’s too early in Simon’s opinion. I think we’re just going to take it a day at a time, try to manage the pain, get him to his appointment with Simon, and see what he thinks. But he definitely doesn’t think it’s the stone fragments in the bladder that is causing this much pain.
I’ve seen people mention potassium citrate on the forum to help stones stop growing, is that something I should be getting? If anyone knows that would be a help. Any opinions on this situation would be great too.
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
I’d definitely be guided by what Simon suggests. I trust his judgement completely. I’d ask Simon about the potassium citrate, rather than go by what you’ve heard online.
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I have the same feeling, that’s why I went to him for a second opinion, he’s the only vet I truly trust. It’s just hard though when Simon hasn’t physically seen BB. I could’ve gotten an appointment for Monday but thought it would still be too soon post op for Simon to realistically do anything, especially since he said the longer we can leave it, the better.
I just need to figure out how to get on top of BBs pain, as that’ll be the deciding factor of whether we even get to this appointment with Simon or whether we have him PTS. It’s so difficult because BB hasn’t ‘given up’. I can usher him out of his hidey and he’ll eat something and have a walk around. This morning, he was given back one of the enrichment toys he hasn’t had since before the op as we wanted to wait until his wound had fully healed and he did some zoomies until he had some pain and then he stopped. It’s such a hard call to make when they’re clearly in pain, but still have a will to live
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
That is a lot of meds. What did Simon think to the amount of pain relief he’s on? x
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He said with that amount of pain relief he shouldn’t be in the pain that he is, especially if it were just the bladder stone that was the problem. He didn’t say anything about upping it or lowering it, and his overall consensus was just to manage BBs pain for as long as we can.
But at this point, we aren’t really managing it because he’s still having pain whenever he poops or pees. I’m just at a loss with it, I dont want to prolong his suffering if nothing can be done in the end
 
Is he in as much pain as you think though? I do find guinea pigs are rather drama queens and vocalise loudly for the smallest thing. I’d have thought he’d be really subdued the whole time if the pain was that bad, but you mention him doing zoomies and being really active between pain episodes. Make sure he has lots of enrichment in the cage as, like us, they feel more poorly when they’ve got nothing to do. If we are feeling rubbish and sit and think about it, we feel loads worse, than if we keep busy x
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
Is he in as much pain as you think though? I do find guinea pigs are rather drama queens and vocalise loudly for the smallest thing. I’d have thought he’d be really subdued the whole time if the pain was that bad, but you mention him doing zoomies and being really active between pain episodes. Make sure he has lots of enrichment in the cage as, like us, they feel more poorly when they’ve got nothing to do. If we are feeling rubbish and sit and think about it, we feel loads worse, than if we keep busy x
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That’s a big thing too, I can’t tell if it’s as bad as it sounds. Sometimes he’s waking himself up to eat, other times I have to wake him (can’t tell if that’s sleepiness due to meds or a pain thing). He’s definitely not eating as much as he was in his initial recovery days, he had gained a lot of weight back when he was eating normally but dropped back down to what he was pre-op. He won’t accept syringe food, he’d kept his weight on himself yesterday but I’ll see if he’s managed to keep it on himself today when I weigh him later. His pain does seem to put him off his food though, he’ll be eating, have pain, then go back in his hidey to sit there. We’re trying to keep him up and about with enrichment, we’ve been calling it ‘giving him some will to live’. He’s definitely in more pain than he was after surgery (will be 2 weeks post op tomorrow), but seems a little better than he was on Friday and Saturday morning as he was quite subdued then and seemed pretty miserable. But he is still eating his hay, just not as regularly or as much as he would be doing without the pain. He’s still very interested in his veggies and will stand on the bars for a pea flake if he’s up and about and hears me moving. So maybe he is being a bit dramatic to some extent? It’s hard to know. The day he had his op, he was in some real agony, he was literally screaming that day before we took him in, it was very hoarse and louder than my own speaking voice - his pain now isn’t even comparable to that. But since he has pain with almost every single poop, it’s pretty frequent
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
The volume of meds may be making him feel crap. I remember taking loads of meds for pain, after falling and injuring my arms. I felt horrendous and the pain was dreadful. I then reduced the meds and immediately felt better and even the pain reduced.
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Okay interesting, thank you for the advice. I’ll give that a try tomorrow morning and keep my eye on him throughout the day. I feel like the tramadol is doing the most in terms of reducing pain, so maybe if I drop the gabapentin tomorrow there might be some difference xx
 
Update
We tried reducing the pain meds for a day and it didn’t help, he was really not well that day. We’ve been trying to keep him busy and comfortable and in as little pain as we can. But the bottom line is that we can’t keep him pain free, it’s just not working. Every pee hurts, every poop hurts. He’s just in a lot of pain almost constantly, and it’s been getting worse over the last few days, his cries are a lot louder and more hoarse. He has some will to live but still, the way he’s living isn’t normal. The pain isn’t normal, he isn’t eating like he should, or moving around like he normally would, he isn’t happy, the medication he’s on is starting to really upset him as in he begins to tremble as soon as he smells the gabapentin and baytril now. The decision isn’t easy but tomorrow, we’re hoping to get an emergency appointment with Simon where we’ll discuss what he thinks and if there’s anything he thinks can be done - which I feel is unlikely - and then if not, we’ll euthanise. I’ve been trying to hold off, but today I just got this sinking feeling that it’s time. I have no hope that we’ll be coming back with him tomorrow, I really want him to but I don’t believe anything can be done, not this soon after his last operation anyway. He’ll only be 3 weeks post op on Wednesday, but it feels like longer. Every day we get through is a fight, and it’s a fight he isn’t able to opt out of and I feel like it’s time I end it for him. Hopefully we have good news, but I don’t think so. I mean, hopefully we manage to score an appointment, otherwise I’m not sure if I can wait until Wednesday to try for one.
 
Oh I'm so sorry to hear this. Poor BB, if he's getting upset about his medications it must be awful for you. It's bad enough medicating when you know there's an end in sight but when you're just praying for them to sleep and maybe get some respite it's impossible to bear. He's such a good little fellow.
You're in our thoughts and prayers x
 
Called up at eight on the dot, Simon doesn’t have time today to do anything but a standard consultation. They managed to book me in tomorrow at 10:30, which is good but also not sure if we can wait that long or if I should just have him PTS later today. It’d be such a shame for him to have been waiting this long for an appointment with Simon just to be PTS the day before, but it’s so hard. I don’t know if it would be cruel to put him through another day
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
Personally I’d try and keep him going until you can see Simon. Is he still eating?
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He hasn’t been eating much in the way of hay - or that’s what it seems like to me. He’ll have about 3mls of syringe food every few hours, he’ll also eat a couple of oats when he brings himself out of a hidey. He’s still loving his veg, though. I’ve been hiding bits and pieces of veg around the cage for him to forage which he seems to enjoy. Hes been maintaining a weight of around 1335 grams, so hes eating enough to keep him stable. His poops are still looking moderately decent. It’s just the pain factor, since every poop hurts, I'm hearing around 10-20 seconds of pain sounds every 5-10 minutes or so.
 
Little Ones said:
He hasn’t been eating much in the way of hay - or that’s what it seems like to me. He’ll have about 3mls of syringe food every few hours, he’ll also eat a couple of oats when he brings himself out of a hidey. He’s still loving his veg, though. I’ve been hiding bits and pieces of veg around the cage for him to forage which he seems to enjoy. Hes been maintaining a weight of around 1335 grams, so hes eating enough to keep him stable. His poops are still looking moderately decent. It’s just the pain factor, since every poop hurts, I'm hearing around 10-20 seconds of pain sounds every 5-10 minutes or so.
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Definitely keep going until you see Simon. Something may have been missed that Simon will pick up on xx
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
Definitely keep going until you see Simon. Something may have been missed that Simon will pick up on xx
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I will try my best to, thank you for the advice - it really helps a lot.
I think Simon thinks it’s whatever is in the urethra causing issues as the small stone fragments in the bladder shouldn’t be causing this level of pain, in his opinion. I guess it all depends on if Simon thinks it’s okay to operate with it only being 3 weeks since his bladder operation, and if Simon thinks whatever is in the urethra can be fixed. I think the location of the problem within the urethra could cause issues. I really want to get him to the appointment tomorrow, if something at all can be done I know Simon will do his best to sort it xx
 
Update:
Yesterday he wasn’t too bad, still in a lot of pain obviously but not as bad as I was fearing he’d be so leaving him another day without treatment wasn’t too bad.
Today we’ve been to see Simon, we’re still here now. He did an X-ray and said he feels the calcification we were worried about isn’t a problem and it must be the stones in the bladder causing the pain. I’m trying to remember all he said, but he said something like what it’s showing on the X-ray is an unusual shape, he can’t tell if it’s one big stone or if it’s little ones. Basically, he’s trying his best to resolve the issue along with prescribe a diuretic afterwards which Bb hasn’t had before. He thinks the surgery is worth doing as it could help if it’s successful especially as this is a last ditch effort to save his life, however if the stones return then we have him PTS.
We’re just waiting for the surgery to be done and for BB to come back to us. He’s been in surgery since around 1 I believe.
 
He’s out of surgery, coming around really well. It was one big stone that was removed and not fragments as the last vet we saw suggested - which means the bladder flush she was going to do could’ve been really bad news had the stone blocked the urethra. So glad we managed to come here and hopefully no more stones will develop 🤞🏻We’re collecting him just after 4
 
If he thinks it's worth doing then I'd be hopeful - if you have enough energy left for hoping. He couldn't have borne his pain for much longer as it sounds like he was suffering a great deal. You've got a realistic plan in place for him. Poor BB has had a rough hand to play in life's genetic card game. He's lucky to have found you - I wouldn't like to think of him with someone who might not have noticed his situation.

Baytril didn't touch George's UTI which is why we had to switch to Septrin. There's another thread at the minute for a pig called Kiro who's kind of in the same boat, although the AB doesn't seem to be hammering his digestion like old Georgie. I'm assuming Simon will give you AB after this op too. Thanks for keeping us informed, we're thinking of you. Everything crossed for BB x
 
Little Ones said:
Update:
Yesterday he wasn’t too bad, still in a lot of pain obviously but not as bad as I was fearing he’d be so leaving him another day without treatment wasn’t too bad.
Today we’ve been to see Simon, we’re still here now. He did an X-ray and said he feels the calcification we were worried about isn’t a problem and it must be the stones in the bladder causing the pain. I’m trying to remember all he said, but he said something like what it’s showing on the X-ray is an unusual shape, he can’t tell if it’s one big stone or if it’s little ones. Basically, he’s trying his best to resolve the issue along with prescribe a diuretic afterwards which Bb hasn’t had before. He thinks the surgery is worth doing as it could help if it’s successful especially as this is a last ditch effort to save his life, however if the stones return then we have him PTS.
We’re just waiting for the surgery to be done and for BB to come back to us. He’s been in surgery since around 1 I believe.
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Fingers very firmly crossed! At least BB is in the best of hands when it comes to fiddly ops.

Simon saved my Ceri nine years ago this month when she had a rabbit-sized 'silent' stone and then suddenly lost weight like nobody's business.
 
Update
We collected BB yesterday at 4:10 and made our way home. The bladder stone that was removed was twice as big as the last one, judging by eye. BB has been eating his hay on and off since we got home, he’s not being fussy with it either like he was pre-op where he’d only eat certain strands. His incision is a little worse than last time as Simon had sewn a catheter in there during the surgery (removed it afterwards). The op and all the meds were so much cheaper than his last surgery (£1400, excluding meds), I believe this was just short of £700 and it included tramadol, gabapentin, frusol and sulfatrim. BB is still in pain when pooping and peeing, not as much as before but there is still pain. It’s not putting him off his food though like it was before. There was a lot of blood yesterday when he was peeing, not sure about today though, - we were told this was normal. Regarding the pain, I was told to expect your standard operation level of pain, I’m not really sure what that means but hopefully the pain BB has is normal. Simon told me there was risk in going in so early, but we had both concluded that if we didn’t try and operate yesterday then the only other option would be euthanasia. I’m really hoping his pain subsides and that the stone never returns. Once he’s eating and drinking like normal, we can start the diuretic which he may need to be on the rest of his life. I really was expecting the worst so I’m glad he came home with us, I’m trying not to get my hopes up though as that huge stone formed within less than a week post op last time. Thank you all for your ongoing support :)
 
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