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Tooth root abscess and dental surgery, help!

Kirstones

Kirstones

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I’m posting on here for a bit of advice, as well as to inform others of a very specific problem I’ve been having with one of my piggies. (Skip to the end for my current situation!)

I have a 4 year old guinea pig called Mavis who lives with two others, two months ago (on her 4th birthday) she stopped eating completely. She was still very interested in food but it seemed like she couldn’t manage to eat properly. Her front teeth were slanted at around a 45 degree angle but they still aligned perfectly. After taking her to the vets they prescribed metacam and gut stimulant and advised that it would be best for her to grind her teeth down naturally. (There were no apparent external problems with her back teeth).

After lots of critical care and metacam she began eating small amounts. An exotic specialist filed her teeth down consciously and she was eating almost normally again for the next few weeks other than it taking a little longer.

Suddenly a month after she originally stopped eating and seemed to be getting better, she developed a large lump on the left side of her face overnight. The vet believed this was an abscess so lanced and drained it, prescribed more metacam and baytril. After 10 days of perseverance the lump grew back to its original size again.

The vet then advised surgery and another assessment to see if there would be any improvement. Whilst waiting for the surgery day her lump was getting bigger and bigger and eventually burst on its own becoming the size of a pea. Before surgery the vet took conscious X-Rays to check if it was a dental issue and found a growth on her jaw. I was referred to an exotic specialist with Mavis being well in herself and having the capacity to wait a few more days.

CURRENT SITUATION
I decided it was best for her to risk the surgery yesterday rather than putting her onto palliative care as I wanted to give her a chance as she’s been a fighter so far. The vet found a hole in her jaw where the abscess was at her tooth root, they drilled this out and made an attempt to pull the infected tooth out with it. The vet was unable to extract the tooth as her jaw has become so fragile and they were worried that her jaw may fracture in the process. Her jaw was scanned and there are no obvious large fractures in it. They have stitched open a small hole in her cheek.

It’s now been 24 hours since her surgery and I was told she was under anaesthetic for a while. She hasn’t really moved out of her pod bed since then but made some attempts at eating pickings of spinach and lettuce last night when I hand fed her. She’s been wheezing/sneezing out some gunk that’s been sitting on her chest and around an hour ago her poops have been getting softer and softer and now she’s having some diarrhoea. I’ve decided to start giving her some critical care as she’s not interested in food at all anymore.

Mavis is my first guinea pig to go through GA and I’ve never had any with dental issues before (let alone this complex).

I’d appreciate any advice or anything that I can do to aid her recovery, especially anyone that’s been in a similar situation!
 
I’m sorry to hear this.

Please do urgently step in with syringe feeding critical care. You will also need to switch from the routine weekly weight checks and ensure you are weighing her daily. This is the only way to ensure she is getting enough critical care feeds each day to keep her weight stable. (The routine weekly weight checks are the lifelong way of ensuring adequate hay intake and are an early warning sign for any potential health issue).

If she is having diarrhoea, then please do contact the vet again now due to the risk of dehydration.
It’s also important you stop giving her veg. She needs plenty of fibre from critical care (and any hay she is able to eat) to help rebalance her gut.

Is she on painkillers and antibiotics?

The guides below will also help further

I hope she is ok

Not Eating, Weight Loss And The Importance Of Syringe Feeding Fibre
All About Syringe Feeding and Medicating Guinea Pigs with Videos and Pictures

Digestive Disorders: Not Eating - Diarrhea - Bloat - GI Stasis (No Gut Movement)

Tips For Post-operative Care
 
Hello and welcome to the forum. I’m so sorry you are going through this. I’ve had a piggy with a tooth root abscess. It took about 2 months to finally get to a point where he was ok. He’s absolutely fine now so don’t give up.

Here is his thread. There’s lots of advice in there from everyone on here.

Dental? Pepper is off to the vets tomorrow

I don’t think diarrhoea, wheezing and sneezing is a normal side effect of surgery. If she hasn’t moved around much today I’d be calling the vets to ask their advice. A vet nurse once told me after I had a piggy go through bladder stone surgery he should be up and moving around by the following afternoon. If you are at all worried about your piggy I would call them and ask their advice.

Start syringe feeding as soon as possible if she is not eating much for herself. If you don’t have critical care then you can use some of her pellets and mix them with water to make a mush.

Put hay right in front of her so she has access to it and hasn’t got to go too far to eat.

Pain killers are an important part of recovery. Is she on any and what dosage?

Also if it’s an abscess then antibiotics will be needed. Zithromax is a fantastic antibiotic for abscesses. But it may stop their appetite while they are on it. It did with my Pepper.

Also you need to keep the wound open so it doesn’t close up and form another abscess. You will need to flush it out with cooled boiled water twice a day for as long as you can. You will need to pick off any scabs that form.

Please feel free to ask any questions.
 
weepweeps said:
Hello and welcome to the forum. I’m so sorry you are going through this. I’ve had a piggy with a tooth root abscess. It took about 2 months to finally get to a point where he was ok. He’s absolutely fine now so don’t give up.

Here is his thread. There’s lots of advice in there from everyone on here.

Dental? Pepper is off to the vets tomorrow

I don’t think diarrhoea, wheezing and sneezing is a normal side effect of surgery. If she hasn’t moved around much today I’d be calling the vets to ask their advice. A vet nurse once told me after I had a piggy go through bladder stone surgery he should be up and moving around by the following afternoon. If you are at all worried about your piggy I would call them and ask their advice.

Start syringe feeding as soon as possible if she is not eating much for herself. If you don’t have critical care then you can use some of her pellets and mix them with water to make a mush.

Put hay right in front of her so she has access to it and hasn’t got to go too far to eat.

Pain killers are an important part of recovery. Is she on any and what dosage?

Also if it’s an abscess then antibiotics will be needed. Zithromax is a fantastic antibiotic for abscesses. But it may stop their appetite while they are on it. It did with my Pepper.

Also you need to keep the wound open so it doesn’t close up and form another abscess. You will need to flush it out with cooled boiled water twice a day for as long as you can. You will need to pick off any scabs that form.

Please feel free to ask any questions.
Click to expand...
Thanks for replying! The vet said she may have aspirated on food during surgery which could cause breathing issues as it’s hard to get it all out of guinea pigs mouths prior to the surgery. She hasn’t been wheezing now for a good hour so she may have gotten the mucus out. She is already booked in for tomorrow and I’ve been told to monitor her very closely until then. I’ve given them an update of her symptoms and they haven’t contacted me back to move her appointment any earlier.

She’s now not eating at all by her self but she has been on critical care every couple of hours throughout the day and I’ll be giving her a full dose for her body weight. She’s still on bayrtil and metacam twice daily and the baytril has so far been working well on the abscess. She’s on 0.45mls of baytril x2 daily and 0.2mls of metacam x2 daily.

I asked about keeping the would open as that’s what I was doing with the original wound from the burst abscess. The vet has recommended not doing anything to the wound and waiting on their advice tomorrow. They have said that she is probably going to be in a lot of pain and there will be lots of inflammation in her jaw and that’s the way it seems to me when I’m feeding her the critical care. I’m wondering if the pain is why she is so withdrawn.
 
Piggies&buns said:
I’m sorry to hear this.

Please do urgently step in with syringe feeding critical care. You will also need to switch from the routine weekly weight checks and ensure you are weighing her daily. This is the only way to ensure she is getting enough critical care feeds each day to keep her weight stable. (The routine weekly weight checks are the lifelong way of ensuring adequate hay intake and are an early warning sign for any potential health issue).

If she is having diarrhoea, then please do contact the vet again now due to the risk of dehydration.
It’s also important you stop giving her veg. She needs plenty of fibre from critical care (and any hay she is able to eat) to help rebalance her gut.

Is she on painkillers and antibiotics?

The guides below will also help further

I hope she is ok

Not Eating, Weight Loss And The Importance Of Syringe Feeding Fibre
All About Syringe Feeding and Medicating Guinea Pigs with Videos and Pictures

Digestive Disorders: Not Eating - Diarrhea - Bloat - GI Stasis (No Gut Movement)

Tips For Post-operative Care
Click to expand...
I’ve replied to some of this further down but thank you for your advice! In the last two months she’s gone from 1.19kg to 1.105 kg so an 85g drop but the vet was quite happy with her weight after everything that’s happened but I’ll be keeping a close eye on it.

She’s not interested in any veg at all now, not even grass! The only thing I’m managing to get in is the regular critical care, I think she has a lot of pain in her jaw due to the surgery. She’s currently on metacam and baytril and has been on both for around a month.
 
Make sure you keep up with plenty of critical care, it is that which she needs most, not veg.
There is no amount for body weight as such, it’s about giving her enough to keep her weight stable each day. It’s a minimum of 60ml per 24 hour period.

Yes pain is a reason they become withdrawn and it is also a reason why they stop eating.
Is she on cat or dog metacam?
Cat metacam is three times weaker than dog. Cat is the one licensed though but a lot of exotic vets still choose dog given its stronger.
I currently have a piggy a bit smaller than yours on a bit bigger dose than yours of cat metacam.
 
Piggies&buns said:
Make sure you keep up with plenty of critical care, it is that which she needs most, not veg.
There is no amount for body weight as such, it’s about giving her enough to keep her weight stable each day. It’s a minimum of 60ml per 24 hour period.

Yes pain is a reason they become withdrawn and it is also a reason why they stop eating.
Is she on cat or dog metacam?
Cat metacam is three times weaker than dog. Cat is the one licensed though but a lot of exotic vets still choose dog given its stronger.
I currently have a piggy a bit smaller than yours on a bit bigger dose than yours of cat metacam.
Click to expand...
She’s on cat metacam, she has been on 0.2mg once daily. The vet advised to give it twice a day so today is the first day that she will be having a total of 0.4mls. I will definitely ask tomorrow if this can be upped.
 
Unfortunately you need dog metacam. When Pepper was poorly he was on 0.4 of dog loxicom twice a day and 0.6 of Zithromax twice a day. He weighed 1.2kg.

Also Pepper was on 0.5 of Baytril once a day. But this did not help his abscess. Zithromax helped his abscess.

I’m not telling you to give these amounts. I’m saying talk to your vet about increasing his medication. We cannot tell you to go again your vet.
 
weepweeps said:
Unfortunately you need dog metacam. When Pepper was poorly he was on 0.4 of dog loxicom twice a day and 0.6 of Zithromax twice a day. He weighed 1.2kg.

Also Pepper was on 0.5 of Baytril once a day. But this did not help his abscess. Zithromax helped his abscess.

I’m not telling you to give these amounts. I’m saying talk to your vet about increasing his medication. We cannot tell you to go again your vet.
Click to expand...
I’m seeing them tomorrow anyway so I’ll make sure that I get stronger if it’s possible. I’m sure they’ll probably recommend that anyway
 
Unfortunately Mavis passed away peacefully in my arms in the early hours of this morning. She was no longer swallowing the critical care and seemed so tired. I cuddled her into her forever sleep and I’m sure somewhere she’s in a field of endless grass. Thank you all so much for your advice, I really appreciate it 💗
 

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I am so sorry you have lost Mavis, take heart you gave her a wonderful life filled with love. Dental issues are the worst in my opinion

Popcorn high little lady 🌈
 
I am so sorry Mavis had to leave you but she would have known you were there when she made her journey to the bridge and departed with your love.
Take care of yourself and treasure the memories of your time with her.
RIP Mavis 🌈
 
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