my bunny ate cat litter gravel

[danihel]

Hi,
my bunny ate cat litter gravel and it seems like she ate a lot of it. She is now in intensive care, they said the only hope is that infusions will help kick start her bowel movement.

Anyone knows anything else that could help please?

 

[RavenousDragon]

I'm not sure of anything else that could help. If she's in intensive care, you've done exactly what you needed to do. Sending my love for a speedy recovery.

 

[danihel]

Thanks but its unfortunately quite bad. I'm not an expert but it seems to me like the material has deposited in the bowels and there is not enough water to diffuse it. Is it impossible to give clyster to a bunny?

 

[JBun]

The only other option that I can see would be for the vet to surgically remove the material from the bowel, and that in itself poses it's own risks.

 

[danihel]

Unfortunately it looks like the material is distributed allover the intestines as well as the stomach.

 

[danihel]

I found this link :http://www.bio.miami.edu/hare/enema.html , where enema is administered to a rabbit. Could it not help?

 

[Blue eyes]

interesting thought on the enema. Have you asked the vet about it? Curious as to what they would think.

Poor bunny. Hope he gets better.

 

[RavenousDragon]

I'm not entirely sure an enema would help. Enemas only reach the last bit of the colon (in rabbits, the small colon). Most of the litter is probably in the large colon (if it's throughout the GI tract like you said). An enema could clean out that last little bit of GI tract, but it would still leave everything else inside the rabbit.

 

[danihel]

So yesterday a more experienced rabbit vet was on duty in the clinic, she reexamined her and checked the x-ray and said the worst blockage is right under the stomach, so enema wouldn’t help anyway. Fortunately after couple of hours in intensive care my bunny started pooping these black rock hard and rather long pieces of poop. And now that most of it seems to be out it looks like she has diarrhea. Now I have no clue what happened to her, I somehow assumed that she ate gravel, but probably it was something else.

photo of her poo: http://dc208.2shared.com/download/k4biUuHk/p00.jpg?tsid=20160812-093706-a6e8dcf1

 

[Akzholedent]

I really hope your little sweet bun gets well soon. <3

 

[danihel]

So ever since she started to poo again, she has diarrhea constantly. I gave her Bio Lapis but it didn't help so far. Yesterday I took her to the vet, she did sonography and found some growth on the intestine near stomach. I'm still giving her Bio Lapis and Rodi Kolan, she drinks a lot, eats hey and selective.
Anybody could tell if this is typical of tumor, could it be something else?

 

[squidpop]

I think the Bio Lapis- electrolytes and probiotics sounds like a really good thing you are doing. Lots of fluids are very important because with diarrhea it is alway dehydration that kills the animal (or human). I think if she has diarrhea you should call the vet and ask if she needs something to stop it, and something like an antibiotic for any bacteria in her gut. True diarrhea in rabbits is supposed to be a medical emergency. Not sure about the tumor.

 

[squidpop]

also might help to read this http://www.bio.miami.edu/hare/ileus.html

 

[danihel]

So they had her feces tested for bacterial infection and found some streptococci. She was taking antibiotics (enrogal) for two weeks but nothing changed, she has loose stool all the time, no dry droppings in sight. Pretty much the only thing that seems to have improved is that she doesn&#8217;t get bowel obstruction so often.

Then she had her feces tested for the third time for parasites and it&#8217;s the first time the tests came positive and found a tape worm and another parasite. Now I&#8217;m giving her Vitaminthe paste (Oxybendazol Niclosamide) for two days, then after 3 day break I should start giving her Sulfacox T.


Is it common that tests on parasites come false negative twice? Can I be assured that the last findings are correct?
Is it possible that she got infected by those bugs later and its not the cause of her condition?
Can dry hay from the shop contain parasites?

Another thing that worries me is she keeps nibbling drywall. There&#8217;s not much I can do about it except having her locked up all the time when I&#8217;m not watching her and I don&#8217;t know if its related to her state.
Should I maybe give her calcium tablet?


Her diet now consists of hay, dry dandelion, supreme selective an occasional mint and basil leaf. Plus Bio Lapis -probiotics and Rodi Kolan - digestion support drops.


Thanks for advice!

 

[RavenousDragon]

In terms of the test, many of the intestinal parasites are shed intermittently. So if you test during a 'non-shedding' time, they can come back negative. I would assume one positive means positive for parasites.

While it is theoretically possible to get parasites from the hay, I would almost assume she had them for a long time without symptoms and got them before you had her. Many times, intestinal parasites show very few symptoms until the immune system is depressed (e.g. stress) and then they are allowed to overgrow and cause issues.

How long has she been on a diet of mostly hay? If it's a more recent change, her GI tract could still be 'cleaning itself out' for lack of a better term and she may take a while to get some solid stools.

 

[danihel]

@RavenousDragon: Thanks very much for making that clear! Its been a three day sample each time but I guess it might have been just bad luck.

Its been about 7 weeks since she&#8217;s mostly on a hay diet. Yesterday I finished giving her the Flatworm medicine and I see no real difference today. After three days I&#8217;m supposed to start the coccidiosis treatment, hopefully that will help.

 

[JBun]

You may want to ask your vet about trying a different med to treat the tapeworm, if your rabbit truly does have this parasite. Oxybendazole is supposed to only be effective against one type of tapeworm. So if your vet hasn't identified the exact species, then I would suggest using Praziquantel if you have it available in your country. It is an antiparasitic commonly used to treat tapeworm in dogs, cats, and sometimes horses.
http://wildpro.twycrosszoo.org/S/00dis/Parasitic/Tapeworm_infection_lagomorphs.htm

If your rabbit still has mushy poop after the parasite treatments, it's possible your rabbit could have a digestive disorder causing the loose stool, and it might require you to make some changes in your rabbits diet to help manage the condition. Or if the growth near the stomach that your vet found, isn't in relation to the tapeworm but is something else, this could also be a possible cause for digestion issues.

Your bun chewing drywall could have something to do with a nutritional deficiency or it could just be normal rabbit behavior of naturally wanting to chew on things. You could try offering rabbit safe branches like apple, willow, hawthorn, etc. to see if your bun just wants some wood to chew on. If you feel you need to supplement calcium and your bun doesn't have issues with calcium build up in her bladder and urine, then you could try giving her some alfalfa/lucerne hay, as it's high in calcium.

 

[danihel]

@JBun: I&#8217;m sorry I forgot to mention that on the next visit the vet couldn&#8217;t find the thing she described as a growth anymore, so that&#8217;s another mystery.
It occurred to me that it might have been the tapeworm but I haven&#8217;t noticed anything in the stool so I assume she has just the cyst stage of the flatworm life-cycle.
After a month when the coccidiosis treatment is over I'm supposed to give them another stool sample for testing.



Thanks for the tip, I used to give her alfalfa until I read that its not good for bunnies.
But could it be that actually too much calcium is the cause of mushy and watery stool?
Something that scares me a lot is that she could have liver damage, is there a simple way to find out, like would the whites of her eyes turn yellow or some other clear symptom?

 

[RavenousDragon]

The best way to detect early liver damage is by doing blood work (specifically a chemistry panel). Only in later stages of liver disease does jaundice (whites of eyes and ears turning yellow) appear. I don't remember if you mentioned doing blood work? If blood work didn't show anything alarming, then liver damage isn't very likely.

 

[danihel]

Update and questions about my poor little bunny:


Regarding the drywall, I bought mineral stones for nibbling and prevented access to dry wall on most places in her room and it seems to have worked.


At the clinic they told me that she does have some growth in her gut near stomach indeed, although according to them it doesn&#8217;t seem to get bigger.
Also the vet told me that doing blood work on rabbits is not a standard procedure for them but she somehow failed to elaborate on it. So there&#8217;s no blood work done yet.
After the coccidiosis treatment they said that she overcame coccidiosis, but that the tapeworm is still there and that its in her gut (not cystercosis). This time they gave me Panacur to give her small lentil size amount daily for one week.


So the tapeworm treatment is over, I&#8217;m gathering poo for another test but nothing has changed. She is losing weight (she used to be 1,55 kg and three weeks ago she was less than 1.3kg). I started giving her raisins recently at least to give her more calories.
She sneezes occasionally and has no dry stool at all. Mostly its greenish slimy moist droppings, sometimes its just liquid diarrhea and sometimes these darker tiny flat denser splotches.
She has developed bald areas on and around her tail probably from the dirt caused by constant diarrhea and I&#8217;m scared to shower her as I don&#8217;t want her to get even sicker. Any advice on how to help her with the bald spots and dirt is very welcome.


I was thinking, is it possible that they misdiagnosed roundworm infection as tapeworm? Because I haven&#8217;t found eggs nor pieces of tapeworm in her stool.


Are there any nutrient supplements for rabbits? Maybe something with iron, B12, folic acid&#8230;?