Missing Eye Bulge

[Guinea_Step_Dad]

Hello all! I've visited this forum countless times to seek advice, and you all have been so very helpful! I'm posting now because I have a concern with one of my girlfriend's guinea pigs.

Gopher is a couple years old, and unfortunately, he had an accident which led to him having his eye removed. It's been kind of a rocky road with his health since.

He developed a large bump on his nose, which the first vet diagnosed as an infection, so he was prescribed anti-biotics. After the treatment, the bump went down for a while, but now it seems to be reforming slowly. She took him to the vet again who said that it may be a tooth abscess. They did X-rays, but found nothing even close to an abscess. His top teeth seem perfectly healthy, but they warned that the bottom teeth could develop into abscesses eventually, so they recommended access to chew toys (which they already have), and a stiffer hay. In the meantime, they diagnosed a sinus infection, and prescribed another round of anti-biotics. The bump hasn't seemed to change, but one pervasive condition that has afflicted Gopher is that in the socket where his eye is missing, it seems to be bulging quite considerably where skin has grown over. Usually a warm compress will help with the bulging, but it just seems to come back.

Has anyone ever seen this before? We are concerned because the anti-biotics don't seem to affect the fluid buildup behind the missing eye socket or the bump on his nose. My girlfriend is worried sick, and I'm hoping someone has some insight into something like this.

Thank you all in advance!

 

[VickiA]

I’ve no personal experience of this, but one of our former foster carers had a piggy who needed an eye removed, and he regularly had a build up of fluid in the socket and needed it drained.
I’ll tag @Wiebke and @furryfriends (TEAS) who may have more experience.

 

[Wiebke]

Please contact your vet. It looks rather like a fluid build up in the eye cavity that would need draining.
I don't have any personal experience as my only eye removal ever has healed off without a hitch but it is not an uncommon complication. Some vets are keeping the scar open post op to allow drainage for this reason.
@Claire W

 

[Claire W]

Hi, my late Eliza sadly had complications when she had her eye removed as she was allergic to the stitches used which caused an infection in her eye socket.

My vet left the eye socket open (a bit horrible to look at if you’re squeamish) but it doesn’t affect the piggy at all. This allowed the pus to drain out although we had to keep the eye socket open by not letting it scab over and we flushed the eye socket with a needle and saline solution. Again, not very nice but my vet showed me what to do.

Her eye socket healed nicely after that but she was left with a fluid build up which we would just wipe away with a tissue as it would just leak out of her skin where it had closed up.

But if fluid is collecting underneath the skin, your vet may wish to open up the eye socket to allow the fluid to drain out?

 

[Guinea_Step_Dad]

I’ve no personal experience of this, but one of our former foster carers had a piggy who needed an eye removed, and he regularly had a build up of fluid in the socket and needed it drained.
I’ll tag @Wiebke and @furryfriends (TEAS) who may have more experience.

That makes sense! I remember reading that pigs have a duct in their eye that helps them keep their eyes moist, and I figured it might be that. We will contact his vet and look into draining techniques! Thank you so much for your reply!

 

[Guinea_Step_Dad]

Please contact your vet. It looks rather like a fluid build up in the eye cavity that would need draining.
I don't have any personal experience as my only eye removal ever has healed off without a hitch but it is not an uncommon complication. Some vets are keeping the scar open post op to allow drainage for this reason.
@Claire W

We definitely will! Thank you so much for your reply!

 

[Guinea_Step_Dad]

Hi, my late Eliza sadly had complications when she had her eye removed as she was allergic to the stitches used which caused an infection in her eye socket.

My vet left the eye socket open (a bit horrible to look at if you’re squeamish) but it doesn’t affect the piggy at all. This allowed the pus to drain out although we had to keep the eye socket open by not letting it scab over and we flushed the eye socket with a needle and saline solution. Again, not very nice but my vet showed me what to do.

Her eye socket healed nicely after that but she was left with a fluid build up which we would just wipe away with a tissue as it would just leak out of her skin where it had closed up.

But if fluid is collecting underneath the skin, your vet may wish to open up the eye socket to allow the fluid to drain out?

We will definitely reach out to the vet and see what they think. I'm hoping it's not a permanent thing for him because if it is leaking, it doesn't seem to leak very quickly. Thank you so much for your reply!

 

[SamC789]

Hi guys! Stressed out girlfriend here. Thanks for posting this, "step dad" <3

I thought I'd clarify a bit more about Gopher's progress to see if this changes anyone's mind about what he's going through.

He healed from the eye removal just fine in December. In the past month or so the developed a large lump on his nose on the side of his good eye. This was falsely diagnosed as an abscess. I live in a small town and they don't have the best pocket pet vets. They gave him an antibiotic specifically for teeth problems. During the 5-course treatment, he coughed out some white phlegm looking stuff. I thought this was the abscess popping. His nose bump went away and he was just fine. It's come back though, and now his bad eye is filling with that milky white fluid they use to clean their eyes.

I've been doing warm compresses to push out that excess liquid because if I don't, his eye gets really swollen. He never seems bothered by it. Eating and drinking and running around like nothing is wrong. He's expelled the liquid himself once, but I do it for him now so that it doesn't get too terribly big. Expelling the liquid doesn't hurt him - he just gets cranky about it.

I took him to a small vet hospital out of town and they thought that since the tear duct was clearly left in his eye, maybe it had gotten infected somehow and this was causing the swelling in the nose and in the closed eye. They did x-rays and saw no abscess. He's been taking baytril for a week now and had no improvement. I called the vet today and asked if he maybe just had allergies. He's always been a sneezy piggy, and once had an allergic reaction to a new brand of hay I tried (weird breathing, stopped when I switched back). The vet agreed and said it could possibly just be allergies. She said they /could/ do nasal surgery but she doesn't really think its necessary. It's not affecting his quality of life at all - other than mild discomfort for a few minutes while I clean his eye.

With all of this in mind, I'm leaning more towards allergies? The pollen is absolutely crazy right now and that's when all of this started. I know it sounds silly but I'm not sure what else it could be at this point. She said I could try giving him children's Benadryl to help the swollen nasal passage. I absolutely don't want to make the wrong call if this is something serious, but at this point I've taken him to two different vets and been monitoring him like a hawk and I have no concrete answer yet.