Lazw
Junior Guinea Pig
Hello everyone,
My lovely 5 year old piggy bramble had a small (5p coin sized) bald patch on her back and after looking closely I could see the skin was flaking a little, but nothing particularly obvious. I suspected ringworm so I treated both bramble and her cage mate with xeno ivermectin, and took her to the vet later that week just to get it checked. The vet suspected either mites which she was happy I'd treated for, or ringworm so she prescribed a course of itrafungol (a week on, a week off repeated for 6 weeks).
Well Bramble is now on the third week of treatment and the bald patch is getting worse- it's now about 5cm across, on one side of her back and I looked closely yesterday to see that the edges are crumbly, the fur in the crust pulls out very easily in clumps. So she's going back to the vets on Monday and they have recommended sending a skin sample off to culture it and see what is going on.
My question is, do any of you have any idea what this could be if she's been treated for both ringworm and mites and it's not clearing up? Another fungal infection that maybe the itrafungol just isn't touching? She's eating, drinking fine, hasn't lost weight and is spayed. Her cage mate is also a senior piggy, she is unaffected by all of this and has a lovely coat of fur. There are no other animals in the house, they live indoors and they're on fleece bedding and have haybox hay.
I'm trying to think of things I can ask the vet as the specialist vet we usually use just doesn't have availability quickly enough for an appointment so I've been using the local vets4pets, however I'm aware they don't have small animal specialists there (they have been very good so far though!). Thanks in advance for any thoughts you might have about things I can maybe suggest to test for/ consider. It's all a bit of a mystery.
My lovely 5 year old piggy bramble had a small (5p coin sized) bald patch on her back and after looking closely I could see the skin was flaking a little, but nothing particularly obvious. I suspected ringworm so I treated both bramble and her cage mate with xeno ivermectin, and took her to the vet later that week just to get it checked. The vet suspected either mites which she was happy I'd treated for, or ringworm so she prescribed a course of itrafungol (a week on, a week off repeated for 6 weeks).
Well Bramble is now on the third week of treatment and the bald patch is getting worse- it's now about 5cm across, on one side of her back and I looked closely yesterday to see that the edges are crumbly, the fur in the crust pulls out very easily in clumps. So she's going back to the vets on Monday and they have recommended sending a skin sample off to culture it and see what is going on.
My question is, do any of you have any idea what this could be if she's been treated for both ringworm and mites and it's not clearing up? Another fungal infection that maybe the itrafungol just isn't touching? She's eating, drinking fine, hasn't lost weight and is spayed. Her cage mate is also a senior piggy, she is unaffected by all of this and has a lovely coat of fur. There are no other animals in the house, they live indoors and they're on fleece bedding and have haybox hay.
I'm trying to think of things I can ask the vet as the specialist vet we usually use just doesn't have availability quickly enough for an appointment so I've been using the local vets4pets, however I'm aware they don't have small animal specialists there (they have been very good so far though!). Thanks in advance for any thoughts you might have about things I can maybe suggest to test for/ consider. It's all a bit of a mystery.
. I'm not sure what to do now really, she's had 2 weeks of itrafungol which I know from previous piggies usually works really quickly if it's ringworm. She's had 3x spot on treatments, again they usually work really quickly if mites. Now she's on baytril- but I'm not holding out much hope. 
