Eyes/Non-crusty Hay in the eye

You can flush it with sterile saline, but flush from the inner part of the eye toward the outer part rather than the other way around. Also be careful that you're not flushing anything up under the eyelid.

Was it sticking out of the eyeball, or just laying on the eyeball? Eye injuries are very painful, and punctures can result in infection and possibly loss of the eye. If it's a puncture wound, I'd consider taking her to an emergency vet tonight. Eye injuries are pretty much the same in all species, and can usually be treated in a guinea pig by any competent vet. Just print of the dangerous medications list from Guinea Lynx and take it with you if you go, so the vet doesn't try to give her some medication she shouldn't have.

The hay wasn't sticking in her eye, but had followed the curvature of her eyeball and gone under her eye lid in the corner. I'll flush with the instructions you gave and see if I can get a better look.

bpatters said:

You can flush it with sterile saline, but flush from the inner part of the eye toward the outer part rather than the other way around. Also be careful that you're not flushing anything up under the eyelid.

Was it sticking out of the eyeball, or just laying on the eyeball? Eye injuries are very painful, and punctures can result in infection and possibly loss of the eye. If it's a puncture wound, I'd consider taking her to an emergency vet tonight. Eye injuries are pretty much the same in all species, and can usually be treated in a guinea pig by any competent vet. Just print of the dangerous medications list from Guinea Lynx and take it with you if you go, so the vet doesn't try to give her some medication she shouldn't have.

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My vet told me it's important to flush the opposite way... from the outside towards the tear duct. He showed me how to do it. If you flush in the opposite direction, debris can get trapped under the lid.

Without anything but my own eyes to examine her, it appears only the tissue is swollen, and the eye itself looks ok.

You're right, pinky, I got that absolutely backwards. Time for me to go to bed.

It looks really irritated so I think she would benefit from antibiotic drops or ointment to prevent an infection. One of mine recently had a hay poke and eye looked ulcerated but the surrounding skin looked fine. My vet gave me an antibiotic ointment. Within a couple of days, it looked normal.

i had the exact same thing happen to one of my pigs a few months ago. i would take your pig the vet AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. eye injuries are really painful for your piggy and can become infected really easily. my girl had a huge cut on her eye ball and her eye lid from removing the hay, and we had to give her medicated eye drops three times a day for about two weeks. she healed right up but now i'm super paranoid about hay getting in my piggies eyes!

No need for the vet. From what. I can see the tissue is a little inflamed but the eye itself looks okay, I don't know which country you are from but in the UK we would give one drop x twice daily of infected eye drops into the eye for two or three days just to be sure an infection doesn't occur from any scratching the hay may have caused when it was in her eye. Eyes are actually a lot hardier than you think and quite good at sorting themselves out so long as no infection is present

loosylastic said:

No need for the vet. From what. I can see the tissue is a little inflamed but the eye itself looks okay, I don't know which country you are from but in the UK we would give one drop x twice daily of infected eye drops into the eye for two or three days just to be sure an infection doesn't occur from any scratching the hay may have caused when it was in her eye. Eyes are actually a lot hardier than you think and quite good at sorting themselves out so long as no infection is present

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I disagree with eyes sorting themselves out. You can't even tell if their cornea is scratched without a vet examining the eye. There have been some guinea pigs on here that have lost eyes due to injuries. I never take a chance with an type of eye injury. Not only are they painful, you need to be sure there's no more debris in the eye that can cause further damage. If there is an injury, a vet is needed to prescribe an antibiotic ointment or antibiotic eye drops.

Infected eye drops are a very good to use to prevent a possible infection, obviously if that does not do the trick then fucithalmic would need to be prescribed!

Infected eye drops seem to be a UK product containing chloramphenicol. I don't think we've got anything similar over-the-counter here. If we do, I don't know about it.

There any many ointments/drops on the market safe to use, there will be something the same im sure where you are. I'm guessing maybe you are usa and yes it is chloramphenicol. We also use golden eye ointment and a couple of others that have escaped my memory right now but I always try that first before asking and paying a vet silly amounts of money be seen just to get my fucithalmic.

loosylastic said:

There any many ointments/drops on the market safe to use, there will be something the same im sure where you are. I'm guessing maybe you are usa and yes it is chloramphenicol. We also use golden eye ointment and a couple of others that have escaped my memory right now but I always try that first before asking and paying a vet silly amounts of money be seen just to get my fucithalmic.

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The only thing you can get here over the counter is sterile saline solution which isn't good to use in an irritated eye because it can cause drying of the eye. Soothing eye irrigation solution for animals is prescribed by a vet and isn't available over the counter. I'm not sure if it's available online without a prescription.

I know Visine makes some sort of "red eye advance" drop, or something along that name. It's supposed to sooth 'extreme' (thus the "advanced") eye irritations. I know I've seen it around my dad's house before. Would that possibly be helpful?

(NOTE: I am not advising it, I'm /asking/ about it, so please don't put it in your pigs eye until someone can answer!)

Maybe just google chloramphenicol eye drops and you will find the products

loosylastic said:

Maybe just google chloramphenicol eye drops and you will find the products

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I still believe that an eye injury should be checked by a vet to make sure there's no damage to the cornea or debris under the lid. If the source of the injury is still there, drops won't do any good.

I personally had an eye injury about 5 years ago. I was putting yard waste in a yard waste bag. I bent over and a dogwood branch clipping that was in the bag hit and knocked off my glasses and punctured the white part of my eye. I pulled it out of my eye and ran in the house to look at it. I was so freaked out, I grabbed my purse and drove myself to urgent care since no one else was home. I was able to see okay but it hurt. The doctor put drops in my eye to numb it and removed a lot of debris under the lid and in the wound. They put me on an antibiotic so it wouldn't get infected and gave me antibiotic eye drops.

You won't know for sure if there's anything left in the eye unless you have it checked by someone who knows what they're doing.

Here is Australia you can get chloramphenicol eye drops without a prescription, I have needed it twice for one of my birds. They do keep it behind the counter so you have to ask for it, it is marketed to treat conjunctivitis.

I was looking it up online but don't see that it's available in the U.S. I did read that it's out of favor in the West because it can cause aplastic anemia. One of the sources said to keep it out of the reach of pets. It didn't differentiate between oral and topical but it seems that it's not used here in the States.

I searched for ophthalmic ointments at the websites of Walgreens, Rite-Aid, and CVS, three of the largest pharmacy chains in the country. None of them carry an OTC ophthalmic antibiotic ointment, so it looks like they're not available in this country. One thing to consider -- an antibiotic ointment is only effective against bacterial infections. If the pig has an injury, or the eye is irritated for some reason, or if the infection is viral, an antibiotic won't be of any help.