Last night when I came home from work, I took Minnie out and saw the top of her head, all around her ears, and along her quill/belly line looking very red and irritated. I turned her over and her belly had patches of red and looked swollen; her eyes were puffed up and it looked like she had a double chin because that area had swelled up. I scanned through the quills along her back and there were a few other red patches.
The reaction had to occur within 24 hours, so I panicked and took her to an emergency vet because she looked so uncomfortable. They did not give a definitive diagnosis, but the record I took home says "Suspected mites and secondary bacterial infection." She has been losing quills, but she is 12 months old and possibly going through her second phase of quilling? I keep all the quills I find to keep track of how many she is losing, and they all have the bulb at the end. Her skin has not been flaky either.
They treated her accordingly for mites and gave me an antibiotic, an anti-inflammatory medication, and advised to give her children's liquid benadryl (she has had similar episodes where allergies were suspected..cleared up very quickly after injection and reaction was never this severe) and they used Revolution while we were there. They did not do an actual skin scraping to verify.
Has anyone else seen a reaction like this to mites? Or one so severe in that short period of time? She only seems to be displaying some of the symptoms of mites. I did not care for the vet and will not go back, but I want to trust her judgment enough to know what is wrong with Minnie. I took her around 7:00PM last night, and I just recently checked her; the skin over forehead is definitely less red, but she is still very swollen.
I gave her the benadryl before going to sleep last night so she could get her extra rest. She had thrown up on the way home last night, which I'm assuming was a combination of stress and nausea from the long car ride (called vet just in case), and wanted her to take it easy. She did eat some around 1AM and 7AM, but mostly slept in between. I know her schedule has to be out of whack and she did not run on her wheel for very long.
Whew. I think that's everything. I would just like opinions from seasoned hedgie owners!
The reaction had to occur within 24 hours, so I panicked and took her to an emergency vet because she looked so uncomfortable. They did not give a definitive diagnosis, but the record I took home says "Suspected mites and secondary bacterial infection." She has been losing quills, but she is 12 months old and possibly going through her second phase of quilling? I keep all the quills I find to keep track of how many she is losing, and they all have the bulb at the end. Her skin has not been flaky either.
They treated her accordingly for mites and gave me an antibiotic, an anti-inflammatory medication, and advised to give her children's liquid benadryl (she has had similar episodes where allergies were suspected..cleared up very quickly after injection and reaction was never this severe) and they used Revolution while we were there. They did not do an actual skin scraping to verify.
Has anyone else seen a reaction like this to mites? Or one so severe in that short period of time? She only seems to be displaying some of the symptoms of mites. I did not care for the vet and will not go back, but I want to trust her judgment enough to know what is wrong with Minnie. I took her around 7:00PM last night, and I just recently checked her; the skin over forehead is definitely less red, but she is still very swollen.
I gave her the benadryl before going to sleep last night so she could get her extra rest. She had thrown up on the way home last night, which I'm assuming was a combination of stress and nausea from the long car ride (called vet just in case), and wanted her to take it easy. She did eat some around 1AM and 7AM, but mostly slept in between. I know her schedule has to be out of whack and she did not run on her wheel for very long.
Whew. I think that's everything. I would just like opinions from seasoned hedgie owners!