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Well I'm going to be one of those people that post a big long hedgehog health history.
We've been having some problems with Quigley. I feel terrible because I didn't even notice at first. We just lost one of our mice (Amy, I posted about it in the off topic section) and so I've been handling Zoe (our other mouse who is now alone) a lot more and she's been getting very clingy. This meant that Quigley got the minimum for a few weeks while I was adjusting to Zoe's extra care requirements. The minimum basically meant food, water a quick check to make sure he was alive and not hibernating and spot cleaning every couple of days. When I did have him out he was just asleep in the blanket.
Then all of a sudden he stopped eating.
November 28th - noticed that he hadn't touched his food the night before, I checked for hibernation and he was warm and responsive but there was no evidence that he had been out of bed at all. "I'm not worried yet, he's not hibernating so he probably just took a night off, he's 4 years old he's aloud."
Novemeber 29th - again no evidence that he had been out of bed or eaten anything. "uh oh this is serious" I took him out to sit with me and noticed a slight redness under his nose (like he licked it raw) and lots of nose licking I put some food in his bed with him. "Ok we'll make a vet appointment tomorrow."
November 30th - still had not eaten. (now I'm freaking out a bit) I syringed vegetable turkey baby food in the morning. Noticed some sneezing in the afternoon. Made the vet appointment
- later I found him laying in the middle of the cage (out from under his blanket). When I picked him up he felt weak - slow to ball up and didn't ball up as tight. I noticed some twitching and movements that looked like muscle spasms
- I put him down to watch him walk and he was dragging his back legs (unknown if this was sudden or gradual because like I said there had been minimal handling)
- I took the wheel out of the cage just in case he tried to use it.
December 1st - no change - syringed more baby food and some water. He was in the same spot I left him in the night before no evidence that he had moved. He squirms around while I am holding him and fights the syringe after a while. He moves around for a minute after I put him back in his cage but otherwise doesn't seem to move at all.
December 2nd - vet appointment this morning. Josh (Boy friend) had to take him because I was working. The vet watched him move which apparently he was uncooperative for (pretty much just wanted to sleep) and then examined him. He has a tumor in his bladder. They did an x-ray to confirm. The x-ray also told us that it is inoperable. He's not getting better from this. Basically we just have to syringe feed him and keep him comfortable. (Keep in mind that he just had a vet check up mid sept. No tumors.)
The vet gave us Oxbow Carnivore Care to syringe feed him (I think we feed it as well as his usual food but Josh wasn't sure about this). The Carnivore Care is a powder so to feed it we have to mix it with water. She also gave us Metronidazole which is supposed to help counteract the damage to his liver from not eating.
I've never heard of the Metronidazole stuff before so I was wondering if anyone knows anything about it. He gets 0.03 ml every 12 hours.
As for the Carnivore Care it's super high in protein but the vet thinks it will help right now. I guess he needs more nutrients. He gets 3 tablespoons (mixed with 6 tablespoons of water) thats 88 ml. Since I can only get him to eat about 3 - 4 ml at a time from the syringe this should be interesting. Does anyone know if I can freeze this? it says on the package that it only lasts 7 days in the fridge and we won't finish the bag before then.
Thanks to everyone on this forum. I'm glad there is a place I can dump all of this information. It would be way too overwhelming otherwise.
We've been having some problems with Quigley. I feel terrible because I didn't even notice at first. We just lost one of our mice (Amy, I posted about it in the off topic section) and so I've been handling Zoe (our other mouse who is now alone) a lot more and she's been getting very clingy. This meant that Quigley got the minimum for a few weeks while I was adjusting to Zoe's extra care requirements. The minimum basically meant food, water a quick check to make sure he was alive and not hibernating and spot cleaning every couple of days. When I did have him out he was just asleep in the blanket.
Then all of a sudden he stopped eating.
November 28th - noticed that he hadn't touched his food the night before, I checked for hibernation and he was warm and responsive but there was no evidence that he had been out of bed at all. "I'm not worried yet, he's not hibernating so he probably just took a night off, he's 4 years old he's aloud."
Novemeber 29th - again no evidence that he had been out of bed or eaten anything. "uh oh this is serious" I took him out to sit with me and noticed a slight redness under his nose (like he licked it raw) and lots of nose licking I put some food in his bed with him. "Ok we'll make a vet appointment tomorrow."
November 30th - still had not eaten. (now I'm freaking out a bit) I syringed vegetable turkey baby food in the morning. Noticed some sneezing in the afternoon. Made the vet appointment
- later I found him laying in the middle of the cage (out from under his blanket). When I picked him up he felt weak - slow to ball up and didn't ball up as tight. I noticed some twitching and movements that looked like muscle spasms
- I put him down to watch him walk and he was dragging his back legs (unknown if this was sudden or gradual because like I said there had been minimal handling)
- I took the wheel out of the cage just in case he tried to use it.
December 1st - no change - syringed more baby food and some water. He was in the same spot I left him in the night before no evidence that he had moved. He squirms around while I am holding him and fights the syringe after a while. He moves around for a minute after I put him back in his cage but otherwise doesn't seem to move at all.
December 2nd - vet appointment this morning. Josh (Boy friend) had to take him because I was working. The vet watched him move which apparently he was uncooperative for (pretty much just wanted to sleep) and then examined him. He has a tumor in his bladder. They did an x-ray to confirm. The x-ray also told us that it is inoperable. He's not getting better from this. Basically we just have to syringe feed him and keep him comfortable. (Keep in mind that he just had a vet check up mid sept. No tumors.)
The vet gave us Oxbow Carnivore Care to syringe feed him (I think we feed it as well as his usual food but Josh wasn't sure about this). The Carnivore Care is a powder so to feed it we have to mix it with water. She also gave us Metronidazole which is supposed to help counteract the damage to his liver from not eating.
I've never heard of the Metronidazole stuff before so I was wondering if anyone knows anything about it. He gets 0.03 ml every 12 hours.
As for the Carnivore Care it's super high in protein but the vet thinks it will help right now. I guess he needs more nutrients. He gets 3 tablespoons (mixed with 6 tablespoons of water) thats 88 ml. Since I can only get him to eat about 3 - 4 ml at a time from the syringe this should be interesting. Does anyone know if I can freeze this? it says on the package that it only lasts 7 days in the fridge and we won't finish the bag before then.
Thanks to everyone on this forum. I'm glad there is a place I can dump all of this information. It would be way too overwhelming otherwise.
