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I have a male albino hedgehog named Little John. He was a rescue hedgie (we got him from someone who didn't/couldn't take care of him.) We think he is around 4-5 years old, but we aren't able to know 100% since the previous owner couldn't tell us a lot about him.
Over the weekend (last week) the temperature outside had dropped pretty low so we turned off our a/c and had the windows open. Little John seemed fine until Sunday night/evening when I went to get him out to play, I saw that he had pulled his fleece into his water bowl and it had sponged up all the water in the bowl and his entire cage was cold and wet.
I had a small heart attack and immediately took him out and rubbed him down with a warm towel and held him, but I think he got too cold and since then he has been exhibiting sudden signs of WHS: extremely wobbly, unable to walk. He just scoots along and there is a lot of tipping over and flailing
I hoped it was just that he had gotten too cold and tried to hibernate (which is bad enough) so I waited a few days before going to the vet. On Sunday he was the worst, but after his initial improvement, I have seen no change and he is still unable to walk normally. He seems very unsteady and tips to the side or just scoots along, which is typical of WHS, but it is his front legs that he seems to be unable to control (I always thought it started from the back and worked forward progressively...?) He is still very much able to use his back legs, but the vet "examined" him and his wobbling and immediately told us he had Wobbly Hedgehog Syndrome and was adamant that it was possible for it to set in suddenly even after we told him about the attempted hibernation. We are still convinced that he has an inner ear infection (or worse had a stroke or something like that.) The vet gave us a Baytril suspension (for a possible infection) and Metacam suspension (which is a NSAID that is commonly used for alleviating WHS symptoms - effectiveness varies but he thought it might help.) The Baytril is a 10 day thing and the Metacam will be every day for the rest of his life.
I'm not sure what I should do. I have been giving the antibiotic and the Metacam (this is day four of the ten day antibiotic regimen) but I haven't seen any changes. He is still his stubborn self, other than the fact that he is scooting around. He even scoots to the side of the cage every night to beg for treats. I think his medicine is making him sleepy as well, because he sleeps a lot more than he did before. We did remove his wheel because we don't want him to injure himself, so maybe he is bored and goes to bed?
I want to get a second opinion, but we already had to drive 45 minutes to get to this vet and he was the closest one to us. If it is WHS, I am going to be pretty devastated, but if not I would like to find out what is actually going on and treat it ASAP...
Edit: We haven't noticed any other symptoms (like discharge from ears/eyes, runny nose, mechanical injury, etc...) He does lose a lot of quills on a daily basis, but he always has and there are no bald spots or signs of mites/parasites.
Over the weekend (last week) the temperature outside had dropped pretty low so we turned off our a/c and had the windows open. Little John seemed fine until Sunday night/evening when I went to get him out to play, I saw that he had pulled his fleece into his water bowl and it had sponged up all the water in the bowl and his entire cage was cold and wet.
I had a small heart attack and immediately took him out and rubbed him down with a warm towel and held him, but I think he got too cold and since then he has been exhibiting sudden signs of WHS: extremely wobbly, unable to walk. He just scoots along and there is a lot of tipping over and flailing
I hoped it was just that he had gotten too cold and tried to hibernate (which is bad enough) so I waited a few days before going to the vet. On Sunday he was the worst, but after his initial improvement, I have seen no change and he is still unable to walk normally. He seems very unsteady and tips to the side or just scoots along, which is typical of WHS, but it is his front legs that he seems to be unable to control (I always thought it started from the back and worked forward progressively...?) He is still very much able to use his back legs, but the vet "examined" him and his wobbling and immediately told us he had Wobbly Hedgehog Syndrome and was adamant that it was possible for it to set in suddenly even after we told him about the attempted hibernation. We are still convinced that he has an inner ear infection (or worse had a stroke or something like that.) The vet gave us a Baytril suspension (for a possible infection) and Metacam suspension (which is a NSAID that is commonly used for alleviating WHS symptoms - effectiveness varies but he thought it might help.) The Baytril is a 10 day thing and the Metacam will be every day for the rest of his life.
I'm not sure what I should do. I have been giving the antibiotic and the Metacam (this is day four of the ten day antibiotic regimen) but I haven't seen any changes. He is still his stubborn self, other than the fact that he is scooting around. He even scoots to the side of the cage every night to beg for treats. I think his medicine is making him sleepy as well, because he sleeps a lot more than he did before. We did remove his wheel because we don't want him to injure himself, so maybe he is bored and goes to bed?
I want to get a second opinion, but we already had to drive 45 minutes to get to this vet and he was the closest one to us. If it is WHS, I am going to be pretty devastated, but if not I would like to find out what is actually going on and treat it ASAP...
Edit: We haven't noticed any other symptoms (like discharge from ears/eyes, runny nose, mechanical injury, etc...) He does lose a lot of quills on a daily basis, but he always has and there are no bald spots or signs of mites/parasites.