loosing weight albino female

[zombiewoman]

Ok friends, I have a mystery to solve. I gave my brother an albino female, who will be one year old in late June. She was a big girl like her sister, who my brother also has. She developed a skin discoloration on top of head look red and changed to a dark color and also on sides were fur met quillz. She was taken to vet and treated with antibiotic and it has cleared up. The problem is she has refused to eat any of her dry cat food, baby food, or chicken. She will only eat crickets and meal worms. She is now only eating only half of them and then spitting them out and is now down to 7 oz or about 200 grams. Temp in cage is regulated, she runs on wheel and explores during her play time, poop and pees normal. My brother is in tears due to weight just keeps going down. He is going to syringe feed her this weekend and try to get weight on her. Her sister is 3x bigger than her. I can't get the pictures to post sorry. Yes she has been to vet multiple times and no mouth problems or any thing else they can find. Any suggestions ?

[Immortalia]

Make sure he keeps syringing her until she starts eating on her own. How long has it been? Might be good to check that fatty liver disease hasn't set in from her lack of eating. He needs to start syringe feeding her every few hours.
What is the time frame? What was the antibiotic? Did they do a scraping of that spot to determine what it was? I'm assuming they e knocked her out to get a good look at all her teeth at the beginning, before she has lost too much weight. What exactly is the temp? Just to clarify, she comes out at night and runs around in her cage and on her wheel.

Have you tried switching to a different food? Hills A/D is a good syringing food.
Have you tried offering kitten food such as royal canin babycat? It's smaller kibble and higher fat. Many hedgies find it easier to eat. What is the expiry date on the food? How long has it been opened? Did you try buying fresh bag of same food? Many hedgies go on strike if their food has gone stale. If new bag, it's possible they messed with the production and changed something. What are th foods you feed? What brands?

Have you tried giving something like benebac probiotic? Many times, antibiotics make their tummies feel like crap. So usually, people would give the antibiotic in the morning, probiotic in the afternoon, then antibiotic at night.

[zombiewoman]

Yes they gassed her to check initial skin lesion which was a couple of months ago. yes to skin scraping and over all examination. They have tried different brands of food and bought fresh of existing brands. Temp of cage is stable at 78 and has not changed. Yes she comes out at night and runs on wheel and enjoys out side play time on big blanket on floor with toys. She has been going down hill slowly over the last couple of months with weight loss. They have tried most suggestions except protonix for tummy. My brother is going to syringe feed her all weekend and I will tell him about protonix. Thanks for suggestions and will post again later.

[Immortalia]

Hmmm, I'm out of ideas currently. I'm giving your thread a quick bump to see if others may have more input.
Just make sure your brother keeps syringe feeding her. The most general rule of thumb is 1cc or 1ml(depending on the syringe) every 1 hour. So if he gives her 3cc's of food, he should feed her again in 3 hours. Of course, the usual, morning, afternoon, evening, midnight snack hours should suffice as well. Whatever he can get into her.

Stool samples have been checked for possible GI upsets? Or maybe even parasites?
Could try blood tests too, just to check her levels, make sure nothing it out of the ordinary. It can tell enzyme levels, kidney/liver functions, etc etc. But being that she's probably much weaker now, probably do the fecal tests, and keep syringing her. Once her weight seems to stop dropping, then think about taking some blood.