Ulcerated Eye

[Ellie-May]

Evening everyone!

Has anyone ever felt with an ulcerated eye? I’ve only really had hay pokes or hay stuck in eye but never ulcerated.

My 1 (nearly 2) year old Erma has one. She was fine the whole of Saturday and woke up Sunday morning with her eye tight shut and it would not open. Managed to get an appointment with my vets the same day and it’s ulcerated. I have no idea how she done it but she’s the only one out of my pigs who have been to the vets the most and it’s always the same issues.

They gave us the normal drops for most eye issues but I’m just wondering how long the recovery is? We have to give drops 3 time a day and it looks like it’s working as her eye is slightly open but will take longer than normal. She’s eating, drinking and is her normal self so I have no worries x

 

[Ellie-May]

Evening everyone!

Has anyone ever felt with an ulcerated eye? I’ve only really had hay pokes or hay stuck in eye but never ulcerated.

My 1 (nearly 2) year old Erma has one. She was fine the whole of Saturday and woke up Sunday morning with her eye tight shut and it would not open. Managed to get an appointment with my vets the same day and it’s ulcerated. I have no idea how she done it but she’s the only one out of my pigs who have been to the vets the most and it’s always the same issues.

They gave us the normal drops for most eye issues but I’m just wondering how long the recovery is? We have to give drops 3 time a day and it looks like it’s working as her eye is slightly open but will take longer than normal. She’s eating, drinking and is her normal self so I have no worries x

I forgot to add you can see she is trying to open her eye and at times it is slightly open but when I put the drops in her eye I can see a while blue dot/clear film in corner of eye so I imagine that’s where it is.

I can tell it’s gonna take a lot longer than before. The vet did say do the drops for 5 days and if I’m still not happy the bring her back x

 

[artcasper]

My winny had an eye injury not long ago and hers was ulcerated.. she had drops 3 times a day & pain relief for 2 weeks... 1st photo is the day after and the 2nd photo is after about 7- 10 days.. I hope your piggy recovers well x

 

[Ellie-May]

Oh no that looks painful sending all my love. Ermas does not look that bad in either picture, it’s mainly closed and she can open it slightly with a little blue/cover in the top right corner.

The vet didn’t give any pain relief but I think that’s because it’s nowhere near as bad but I think it will take longer than 5 days x

 

[zez]

My Spice had an ulcerated eye a couple of weeks ago. She had drops 4x a day for the first weekend and then 3x when I went back to work. After a week on the drops, her eye was totally back to normal.

 

[Ellie-May]

My Spice had an ulcerated eye a couple of weeks ago. She had drops 4x a day for the first weekend and then 3x when I went back to work. After a week on the drops, her eye was totally back to normal.

When it waa a hay poke/hay stuck in eye it took 3 days and was fine but I feel this could take longer.

My only concern is that her eye is stil shut majority of the time. She can open it and you can tell it’s slightly better than yesterday but I’m concerned something is in it.

I recently registered at a new vets mainly because they’re open 24/7 and they’re really good, however I always see different vets since I’ve gone so I’m just concerned they’ve missed something. She did say she checked the whole eye and could not see anything but she knew her whole history so was impressed. I’m still at the old vets where the exotic vets is, but whenever I need a vet it’s always out of hours lol so we go to the bigger one x

 

[Wiebke]

Evening everyone!

Has anyone ever felt with an ulcerated eye? I’ve only really had hay pokes or hay stuck in eye but never ulcerated.

My 1 (nearly 2) year old Erma has one. She was fine the whole of Saturday and woke up Sunday morning with her eye tight shut and it would not open. Managed to get an appointment with my vets the same day and it’s ulcerated. I have no idea how she done it but she’s the only one out of my pigs who have been to the vets the most and it’s always the same issues.

They gave us the normal drops for most eye issues but I’m just wondering how long the recovery is? We have to give drops 3 time a day and it looks like it’s working as her eye is slightly open but will take longer than normal. She’s eating, drinking and is her normal self so I have no worries x

Hi!

Surface ulceration is when a hay poke or scratch to the surface gets infected. the first aim is to clear the ulceration (gunk) as quickly as possible so your vet can then get a better idea what is going on underneath. An ulcer can come on very quickly. Treatment is the same as the eye drops are an antibiotic; only that they are now used against an existing infection instead of trying to prevent one.

I would recommend that you get hold of some artificial tear gel like viscotears if possible (from a pharmacy or online).
My own vet now prescribes it with any eye injury. The hydration helps with washing out the gunk from the ulceration, make the eye feel more comfortable and does help to support and speed up the healing process - it does really make a difference in my own experience with plenty of hay pokes over the years. You need to wait at least 30 minutes after the medicated eye drops before using the gel in order to allow the drops to be fully absorbed by the eye. Give the gel three times a day, ideally as close to an 8 hour rhythm as you can get.
Plain artificial tear drops will also do the trick but they are more difficult to apply and they last less long, so you may have to give them up to 6 times a day, especially in the early days. Again, you always need to wait for the medicated drops to be fully absorbed.

All the best! Most eye injuries heal thankfully fairly straight forward.