Bunny has noisy breathing and sneezing, even after several antibiotic attempts.....

[arashi_ca]

Hi all,

I have a 9-year-old dwarf hotot named Lily who has been sneezing and having noisy breathing since December 2012... But only 3 times I've noticed the yellow sticky discharge since December till now, I check her everyday. Most times it's just dry sneeze or sneeze with some clear watery discharge.

I have visited the vet Many times and tried 3 different antibiotics...Below is the summary of my visits:

December 17, 12: Vet prescribed Baytril 50mg/ml for 2 weeks, Lily was improving, with only occasionally sneezing, but after the antibiotic treatment the symptoms returned to be worse

January 15, 13: Vet did aerobic culture, which came back Negative, no growth. Lily was still not better

February 1, 13: Vet prescribed Azithromycin 600mg suspension. After feeding Lily the antibiotic for 1 day, Lily got diarrhea, so it was stopped immediately. Luckily Lily's appetite resumed, stool returned normal on the 2nd day after feeding her critical care. But her sneezing problem still remain but I was reluctant to go back to vet again...

February 24, 13: Switched to another clinic. New vet did X-ray on Lily, X-ray showing clean lung, but respiratory tract seemed a bit narrow (?). Vet prescribed Doxycycline 5mg/ml for 2 weeks, which did not improve the symptoms.

March 3, 13: Brought Lily to vet for a physical follow-up. Lily did not have fever, weigh 3.40 lb (a slight decrease from Feb 24). Vet suggested nebulization and DNA testing down the throat, but I have yet to make a decision.

Yesterday the Doxycycline was finished, and Lily is sneezing and breathing more frequently. I really don't know what to do, and in total, I have already spent $830 CAD on this issue...

I kind of want to do nebulization, which involves taking Lily to vet once every 2 days to put mask on Lily for 30min to breath in vaporized antibiotic. Each session is around $45 CAD, and need to do 4-5 sessions. But since I have to go to school everyday+Exams, it's not feasible for me to go to clinic every 2 days...And there is no guarantee that it will cure Lily, it may just be another useless attempt.

My mom is very fed up with Lily and she refuses to spend anymore money... She thinks since Lily is so old, we should just let her be.
She also thinks that Lily is distracting me from my schoolwork and job search, she recommend that we give Lily to Humane Society so to avoid the problem, which I angrily refused. She then suggested Euthanasia which I also refused...

Now I don't know what to do... I don't know if keeping Lily with me until the end is the best choice for Lily, or give her away so the Humane Society will treat her (?), or force my mom to throw in more money, hoping for the better.

Lily is 9-year-old, that's too old to withstand any harsh treatments...
But she still eats lots of hay, as hyper as ever, pooping normal, I would hate to see her go, but also hate to see her suffer... It just breaks my heart every time she sneezes loudly or breath loudly...

If anyone could give me any guidance or suggestion as to what to do, I'd really appreciate it.

Thank you very much.

 

[tolstoibunny]

I'm sorry to hear your bunny is ill. Perhaps you could try to tell your mom that giving up at this point would distract you even more than treating Lily. I know I could never forgive myself if I gave away a sick pet or didn't try everything possible before giving up (if the pet was still happy and not too sick, that is).

I've got a chronic sneezer bun as well and I've found pediatric nasal drops very helpful. They are basically natriumchloride, but nasal drops come with antibiotics, too. Nebulizing or more basic "hot kettle and vapor" with bunny in carrier box (bunny in, kettle outside) can help. Nebulizers are fairly cheap to buy if compared to frequent vet visits and it's best to nebulize twice a day anyway, so I don't think doing it at the vet's office is sufficient. You could also try to boost her own immune system with prebiotics, vitamins and perhaps Echinacea drops.

Good luck, I hope Lily gets better.

 

[arashi_ca]

Thank you tolstoibunny for your kind reply.
I will talk to my mom about this again and hopefully she will understand. I know I will hate myself (and my mom) for eternity if I just give away Lily in this condition without trying everything possible.

Right now I am thinking to pay another visit to vet for the DNA testing. Because right now we don't know what is causing the symptoms (since the culture failed), so another test to confirm the pathogen is probably better than getting random antibiotics (want to avoid diarrhea).
Then I will ask about nebulizer and buy one to do it at home. And ask the vet about the nasal drops and prebiotics that you recommended.

Thank you again for the reply!

 

[Nancy McClelland]

Have you changed bedding (allergies) and did they do a culture.

 

[arashi_ca]

Yes I used to use pine bedding but since December 2012, I switched to Carefresh natural.
They did do a culture (nose swap, Jan 15, 13) and after 2 weeks, the results came back negative, showing no bacterial growth. The vet said that they had difficulty growing despite waiting for 2 weeks and did not grow anything useful (or anything at all?)

So I am thinking to do the DNA test, which should be more accurate as suggested by my new vet. But it will cost a bit so I will have to persuade my mom first and fast.

 

[existenziell]

I don't know if this would at all help, but when I took my bun in we found out she has allergies and the vet prescribed children's benadryl. I had to give her .75 ML of children's benadryl (the liquid alcohol-free kind) twice daily with a syringe. If you're desperate, it might be worth a try. My bun is allergic to the Carefresh bedding actually and has sneezing/clear runny nose. Anyway, it seemed to help. I mean, it could be worth a try if you haven't done that already.

I'm sorry that your bun is sick! I don't mean to sound at all preachy, but I think it would be best for Lily if you kept her til the end. She deserves to live out her days with the person she loves and trusts. And I'm sure you would miss her more and worry about her if she wasn't in your care. Hopefully she gets better.

 

[JBun]

Allergies are a definite possibility, since the sneezing and noisy breathing started Dec., and that is also when you switched to a new litter. I would suggest switching back to pine litter to see if that stops the sneezing. If it doesn't, you could try other litters too, like aspen bedding or kaytee soft granules bedding, to see if it makes a difference. You may even want to try different hay types, if switching litter doesn't help. Rabbits can also have allergies to certain hay, so you could try different grass hays, to see if it clears up the problem. But I'm thinking that the litter is a strong possibility of being the cause of the problem, since both things happened at the same time, unless you made the switch after she started having these health problems.

 

[arashi_ca]

Thank you existenziell and JBun for your comments.
Actually I was using pine bedding the whole time for 9 years until December 2012, when the sneezing started, that I went to the vet and was told to switch to Carefresh. So I don't think the bedding is the main problem, since the switch was made After the sneezing started.
I will ask the new vet about allergies and children's benadryl, but the vets seem to only consider the issue being respiratory tract infection...
I even added a humidifier to decrease dryness in Lily's room.

One question about the nebulizer: does it matter which brand/specs that I use? I checked on ebay.ca and the price varies. They all seem to serve the same function but I just want to make sure.

Thank you again!

 

[JBun]

Maybe the antibiotics just need to be given for a longer period of time and at a stronger dose. It sounded like the baytril initially seemed to help

 

[missyscove]

I've been having a somewhat similar situation with my rabbit. She began sneezing one month after I adopted her, I took her in to school (I'm a 1st year vet student) and had her looked at. We started baytril, she only got worse, we did radiographs and her lungs were clear, I added a humidifier to my room, we did a culture, the culture came back with staph intermedius, moraxella and bordatella, all are sensitive to doxycycline so we started on that and at this point I also started nebulized saline. I find that she breathes much easier after the nebulization.
This is a youtube video of how I made a box to nebulize my rabbit and how I do it with her. I tried a mask but she really struggled whenever it touched her whiskers. In the box she digs at the blanket a few times and then calms down. I got my nebulizer off ebay too as to buy one you're supposed to have a physician's prescription (but apparently you can resell them just fine). You can often get one secondhand from somewhere like goodwill or the salvation army or off craigslist and then you can use that air compressor and just get new tubing and the actual nebulizing portion.
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V29dG5fU5J4[/ame]

Do you know if the culture was aerobic or anaerobic? We just did aerobes but if nothing came back on yours, I would worry about anaerobes.
They really can be sneezy for life with some conditions. My very first rabbit sneezed her entire life with little discharge. We tried antibiotics and allergy meds and saw no improvement If you're seeing a lot of discharge though, and it sounds like your bunny is having trouble breathing, I would keep trying.
I have no idea if they're actually helping, but I've also been giving my two the oxbow immune support hay tabs.

 

[arashi_ca]

Thank you missyscove for the comment.
The culture was aerobic and it showed nothing. Anyway I have booked for DNA testing for Lily this Thursday, hopefully it will give some results. It was such a pain to fight with my mom about additional treatments.

I was actually browsing through your videos earlier today, they are really helpful!
I am searching for nebulizer in local stores, as I really dislike shipping in Canada (may take weeks, which I do not have). I found some people on Kijiji selling used compressor but I've no idea where to buy the tubings+mask etc, but guess I'll try eBay.ca.

 

[missyscove]

You should theoretically be able to get the tubing and the actual nebulizing part from a human pharmacy, but you may need a prescription to be able to do so (and your vet should be able to prescribe this for you if that's the case). If you're nebulizing actual drugs, then the mask is more useful because you don't want the drug to just end up in their fur, but in my case I found using the box to be so much less stressful for her and I'm just using saline to help loosen things up so it doesn't really matter if she doesn't inhale it all.

 

[tolstoibunny]

Some nebulizers are more noisy (pediatric ones are less) and some mist larger vapor "particles". I think best nebulizer is a quiet one that preferably mists small "particles".

 

[arashi_ca]

Thank you missyscove and tolstoibunny for the reply.

I found someone locally selling a second-hand Penguin Pediatric Nebulizer (looks like this: http://www.wayfair.com/John-Bunn-Neb-U-Tyke-Ic-Penguin-Pediatric-Nebulizer-JB0112-062-JBU1003.html). The particle size range is: 0.5 - 5 microns, seems small enough.
I will ask vet on Thursday to buy new nebulizer kit but probably just use the second-hand compressor.

 

[missyscove]

I hope it works well for you. I generally leave the compressor on the floor and she's in her box on my bed so she does get some distance from the compressor. Occasionally she'll get a treat too, but most of their treats are hay based and if she doesn't eat them they get pretty soggy in there.

 

[tonyshuman]

I would do the nebulizer treatments if you can. However, it sounds like thymoma to me, since there was nothing on the culture, antibiotics aren't working, and there was a reduced size of the respiratory tract. Thymoma is a cancer of an organ near the heart that puts pressure on the heart, lungs, and trachea. We had a bunny with this, went through similar treatments, and the only thing that made it improve was nebulizing and metacam (because it is anti-inflammatory and reduces swelling). There are radiation treatments for thymoma that are successful, but they are expensive and stressful to the bunny. I would ask to take the x-rays to another vet that may have seen this before in rabbits. I have posted our x-rays from Benjamin on this website. I've included a detailed description of his saga here: http://www.rabbitsonline.net/f22/thymoma-65940/

 

[arashi_ca]

Thank you missyscove, tonyshuman for the reply.

Last evening I decided to ignore my mom's complaint for rabbit fur in air, and gave a try by putting Lily's cage into the living room beside the bigger window (changed environment) for 24 hours. Before Lily lived in the smaller sun-room (which also has a window though). During these 24 hours, I felt that she was breathing more smoothly (less labored sound), although still had occasional sneezing.

Anyway I took Lily to vet today for scheduled DNA test for virus and bacteria, the results should come back by next week. I mentioned the changed environmental to the vet, he suggested that if the DNA test comes back negative, then the issue is probably allergy to stuff in the sun-room.

Then Lily was given a nebulizing session at vet's office for 30 min with some medicine to loosen mucus.

When I asked about nebulizing at home, using a compressor and nebulizer kit etc, and my need for possible prescription, the vet just went on ranting about how their nebulizer is better. It gave me an impression that he would not readily give me the drugs or prescription to let me do it at home.

Anyway my plan is to observe Lily for any improvement since the first nebulizing session + changed environment, while waiting for the DNA test result to come back. Then I will see if I can push the vet to give me the meds for nebulization at home.

If the issue is really thymoma like tonyshuman suggested, the most I can do is nebulizing at home and hope for the best... There are so few rabbit-savvy vets near my area and this is already the second clinic I've visited. And since I just had a huge fight with my mom about Lily, I am now officially on a tight budget.

I will update once the results come out, hope for the best. Thank you for all the support!

 

[missyscove]

I considered a thymoma, but it should be something you would notice on radiographs and you said that those had been done. We considered that with my sneezing bunny too (although my vet didn't tell me about the rabbit he'd seen a week before with a huge one until after Cricket's rads came back clear).

 

[Zanirtak]

Hi!

I realize this was 8 years ago, but I am currently going through something similar. What ended up being the result?

Thanks!