Pro C/Poo pellets as well as Emeprid?

[Gazzdw]

Hi everyone,

First off just want to say thank you for all the contributions, I have learnt so much and felt so supported throughout losing pigs in the past.

Currently nursing 3 year old pig who we suspect has a GI issue. After seeing she looked very bloated and wasnt walking around comfortably, bit listless and not eating as much as her friends we took her to the vet 2 days ago (26th) for a very thorough examination but the vet couldnt convincingly say she has/had bloat. We have been prescribed emeprid which she has been successfully taking (0.5ml 3 times a day). He said as long as she keeps taking medication and eats for herself and behaves like herself he expects her to make a recovery.

I started the 40ml+ critical care routine yesterday morning as she was hunched up and I wasnt convinced she had ate a lot of hay in the night. By the end of the day she seemed very bright but as you know you get false hope!

This morning she seemed alert and eating hay for herself, walking a round but not fully herself. Every time I syringe her she is so feisty (the most difficult of any pig I have syringed) and she is eating hay between each 1ml syringe (as I put some on the table with her). Overall today seems better but not getting hopes up and due for her 3rd feed in next 2 hours.

Last 2 to 3 days she has had lots of belly gurgling but she has had that for months!

We have removed all veg today so she hasnt had any in 24 hours so I'm not expecting normal looking poos yet. At the moment she is pooing a lot but they are small (about half the normal size) soft and come out in 2s or 3s together.

We are hoping to get her into the Cat Rabbit clinic tomorrow when they open or another exotic friendly vet for hopefully an even greater examination incase of a ovarian cyst or anything else....but until then I am unsure if when giving critical care + water + emeprid I should also be giving her Pro-C or mushed up healthy pig pellets? As I understand Emeprid is a gut stimulant so I dont want to overload her with gut related stuff (her last feed I gave her water infused with Oxbow digestive support tablet as I was waiting for Pro-C in the post).

Thank you so much for your input.

 

[Wiebke]

Hi everyone,

First off just want to say thank you for all the contributions, I have learnt so much and felt so supported throughout losing pigs in the past.

Currently nursing 3 year old pig who we suspect has a GI issue. After seeing she looked very bloated and wasnt walking around comfortably, bit listless and not eating as much as her friends we took her to the vet 2 days ago (26th) for a very thorough examination but the vet couldnt convincingly say she has/had bloat. We have been prescribed emeprid which she has been successfully taking (0.5ml 3 times a day). He said as long as she keeps taking medication and eats for herself and behaves like herself he expects her to make a recovery.

I started the 40ml+ critical care routine yesterday morning as she was hunched up and I wasnt convinced she had ate a lot of hay in the night. By the end of the day she seemed very bright but as you know you get false hope!

This morning she seemed alert and eating hay for herself, walking a round but not fully herself. Every time I syringe her she is so feisty (the most difficult of any pig I have syringed) and she is eating hay between each 1ml syringe (as I put some on the table with her). Overall today seems better but not getting hopes up and due for her 3rd feed in next 2 hours.

Last 2 to 3 days she has had lots of belly gurgling but she has had that for months!

We have removed all veg today so she hasnt had any in 24 hours so I'm not expecting normal looking poos yet. At the moment she is pooing a lot but they are small (about half the normal size) soft and come out in 2s or 3s together.

We are hoping to get her into the Cat Rabbit clinic tomorrow when they open or another exotic friendly vet for hopefully an even greater examination incase of a ovarian cyst or anything else....but until then I am unsure if when giving critical care + water + emeprid I should also be giving her Pro-C or mushed up healthy pig pellets? As I understand Emeprid is a gut stimulant so I dont want to overload her with gut related stuff (her last feed I gave her water infused with Oxbow digestive support tablet as I was waiting for Pro-C in the post).

Thank you so much for your input.

Hi

You can use both pro C (probiotic gut support to help with stocking up with gut microbiome) and mushed pellets (feeding support) as needed; they are all doing a different job to the emeprid and don't interfere.

All the best with your gut problem. My Barri has chronic gut issues, so he is on a long term gut meds cocktail.

 

[Gazzdw]

Thank you so much for such a quick reply

Ok great thank you - probably a silly question but what is the best way to prepare mushed up healhy pigs poo for syringing another pig?

And the Pro -C may be like a quarter tea spoon in a small guinea pig water bowl? Whatever resource I use Its hard to gauge an exact measurement if syringe feeding.

Thank you - Does your Barri have to be fed separately from the others every day? What do you have him on? Repeat prescriptions?

Just went upstairs and Janet (our poorly pig) was squeaking at me and clambering up the C+C as per!

 

[Wiebke]

Thank you so much for such a quick reply

Ok great thank you - probably a silly question but what is the best way to prepare mushed up healhy pigs poo for syringing another pig?

And the Pro -C may be like a quarter tea spoon in a small guinea pig water bowl? Whatever resource I use Its hard to gauge an exact measurement if syringe feeding.

Thank you - Does your Barri have to be fed separately from the others every day? What do you have him on? Repeat prescriptions?

Just went upstairs and Janet (our poorly pig) was squeaking at me and clambering up the C+C as per!

You can find our poo soup recipe in the probiotics guide as well as in the emergency guide and in the syringe feeding guide.

But you basically take the healthy piggy out, give them a little veg treat/part of their veg food allowance (eating triggers poo production).
Collect the freshly dropped poos, soak them in a little water as soon as the water becomes discoloured and then syringe the water immediately. No need to to mush the poos. The crucial point it that you need to keep the time between poos being dropped and the microbiome being syringed to ideally less than 5 minutes; the quicker you are the more live stuff will reach the gut.
Probiotics, Recovery Foods And Vitamin C: Overview With Product Links

 

[Wiebke]

PS: Barri is on daily emeprid, cisapride and metacam, to be given as needed as he tends to have flares and then some quieter times.
He is being seen every half year at Cat&Rabbit Care Clinic for a check up.
His file and prescription has been forwarded to my local vets so I can pick up the meds as needed locally.

 

[Gazzdw]

Oh wow your commitment to caring for Barri's needs is truly inspiring. It blows my mind how complex a guinea pigs health can be.

With the Pro-C in water, I'm giving around 0.3ml of water between each 1ml Critical Care syringe, (taking that water from a small guinea pig bowl), how much Pro-C should roughly be in that bowl of water? I thought about following the tube instructions of 1 scoop in 200ml of water then decanting it but if I did that the water I am giving between CC syringes wont be very strong with Pro-C.

Hope that makes sense and thank you!

 

[Wiebke]

Oh wow your commitment to caring for Barri's needs is truly inspiring. It blows my mind how complex a guinea pigs health can be.

With the Pro-C in water, I'm giving around 0.3ml of water between each 1ml Critical Care syringe, (taking that water from a small guinea pig bowl), how much Pro-C should roughly be in that bowl of water? I thought about following the tube instructions of 1 scoop in 200ml of water then decanting it but if I did that the water I am giving between CC syringes wont be very strong with Pro-C.

Hope that makes sense and thank you!

I mix a pinch of probiotic powder into a portion of syringe feed; it's as simple as that.

 

[Gazzdw]

An Update:

We lost her this afternoon. In all my years looking after pigs (over 20 of them) I have never known one to go from looking so optimistic to complete lamness, fitting then the end.

Fed her dose of CC this morning at 11am and she seemed on the mend but not fully herself, at 1:15 we came back from a dog walk and she couldn't move. We were on the way to the vets and she started fitting and that continued until we handed her over to help her on her way.

We had a post mortem and they had never seen what had happened before. They admitted in cases of bloat they dont tend to visibly see the tract as they did with Janet. She basically developed what looked like a fibrous muscle around the bit before the secum (spelling) and the stomach itself was fine but there was a huge build up and distension stopping it passing through. The vet said he expected upon death that the muscle would loosen but it hasnt and he has been unable to pass any food through the system.

Even if this was caught at an earlier stage it would not have been operable as their digestive system does not take well to surgical intervention.

I am hoping this sort of information will be on her file and we can access read it so it makes more sense but what I have learnt is that at the first instance of a suspected GI issue get the most thorough evaluation possible.

I would love to know if anyone else has experienced something similar or can better understand what the vet was explaining. Hope this helps other piggy owners down the road!

 

[Wiebke]

An Update:

We lost her this afternoon. In all my years looking after pigs (over 20 of them) I have never known one to go from looking so optimistic to complete lamness, fitting then the end.

Fed her dose of CC this morning at 11am and she seemed on the mend but not fully herself, at 1:15 we came back from a dog walk and she couldn't move. We were on the way to the vets and she started fitting and that continued until we handed her over to help her on her way.

We had a post mortem and they had never seen what had happened before. They admitted in cases of bloat they dont tend to visibly see the tract as they did with Janet. She basically developed what looked like a fibrous muscle around the bit before the secum (spelling) and the stomach itself was fine but there was a huge build up and distension stopping it passing through. The vet said he expected upon death that the muscle would loosen but it hasnt and he has been unable to pass any food through the system.

Even if this was caught at an earlier stage it would not have been operable as their digestive system does not take well to surgical intervention.

I am hoping this sort of information will be on her file and we can access read it so it makes more sense but what I have learnt is that at the first instance of a suspected GI issue get the most thorough evaluation possible.

I would love to know if anyone else has experienced something similar or can better understand what the vet was explaining. Hope this helps other piggy owners down the road!

BIG HUGS

I am ever so sorry about your loss. It is one of these things that are unforeseeable and therefore unpreventable and often untreatable. The more we learn about guinea pigs the more complex they get; just like any other pet. Every boundary that vets push back only opens new vistas on even more problems.

This is also not the best time to have something like this happen when vet access is not always accessible. I lost one of mine to what turned out be a blockage over Christmas Day three years ago when half of the city's out of hours services had just had the clinic roof cave in due to a burst frozen pipe and the other one being hopelessly snowed under. Myfina sadly passed away just when I set up my other piggies for the day as I had been warned I would be facing a several hours' wait even for an emergency pts/euthanasia. it is even worse when the only piggy savvy vet you can access won't be open until the next year.
I really feel for you.