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When to become worried

fourbwabbys

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I haven't heard it in a while, but Eddie "hoots" sometimes. It's not frequent, I haven't heard it in a few weeks. When we first brought him home, he did it a lot more frequently, but it eventually went down. My question is when do you start getting worried about a heart condition? I read on GL that hooting can be an enlarged heart that is pressing on the trachea. Do you think that this can be the case if it's not consistant at all? It has gone down loads since we first brought him home, but he does do it every once in a while. Any help is appreciated.
 

Slap Maxwell

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Maia did it a lot and I think that is how she passed away. It might be a good idea to get an ultrasound of his heart by a vet at some point. Also check for other signs of heart problems listed on GL.
 

fourbwabbys

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It might be a good idea to get an ultrasound of his heart by a vet at some point.

So do you think it's ok to wait until he starts up again? I haven't heard him do it in a while, so I might just wait to see if he does it again. If it doesn't go away, I'll take him in to the vet.
 

salana

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I'm not sure I would bother with an ultrasound. You can't always see heart problems. The best way to detect them is by trying out heart meds such as Enacard, Lotensin, or Vetmedin.
 

Ly&Pigs

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I wouldn't wait till he starts doing it again. If he has a heart condition, the meds will help now. Cavies go downhill so fast that it's much better to be safer now than to be sorry later.
 

fourbwabbys

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Ok, thanks everyone. Can anyone tell me what to expect when I bring him in? Do you think an x-ray is necessary, or should he just be put on the meds? And if it isn't a heart problem, will the meds hurt him at all?
 

Ly&Pigs

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I would go to GL and search for "heart pigs" or "heart issues" over there and read up on the threads others have posted. That way you can see what many of the signs are for heart pigs and what tests heart pig owners have had done to diagnose and see the different meds some heart pigs are on.
 

fourbwabbys

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salana said:
I'm not sure I would bother with an ultrasound. You can't always see heart problems. The best way to detect them is by trying out heart meds such as Enacard, Lotensin, or Vetmedin.

Ok, I looked on GL and he doesn't have the syptoms listed there besides the hooting. By reading, I found he would have an x-ray and most likely be on Fortekor. I didn't find anything about the x-rays, do you think they're necessary, or would the meds be enough?
 

fourbwabbys

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Thanks a bunch Ly. Ok, now that I know what to expect, I'll try to get him a vet visit. Another question that I couldn't find here or on GL, he has a very different sqeak than the other pigs. It almost sounds like he is losing his voice, it's raspy, starts out quiet and gets louder. I don't know if this has anything to do with it, but he tends to jump a little when squeaking, compared to the other pigs. Could this be related?
 

Ly&Pigs

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Possibly. It's hard to know for sure. I think in one of those threads I gave you the links for, it talked about one pig hooting that also had a raspy sounding wheek. I don't remember for sure, it could have been another thread I read that I didn't link. What I did on gl was do a search for the word "hoot".
 

fourbwabbys

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I did a search on the word "hoot" but did not find anything that directly related the raspy squeak to the hoot. I found some threads that had talked about the raspy squeak, but nothing directly realted with hooting.
 
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