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Sick Pain Management and Vit C

stef603

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I have a 3 year old female piggy. At the age of 18 mos, she developed a constellation of symptoms:

hopping and then dragging, hind limbs
lethargy
minimal appetite
struggling to rise after laying down
seizures
crying when being handled

A trip to the local vet vet diagnosed a Vitmin C deficiency. After 2 weeks of mega-doses of 200 mg/day of C, she seemed to rebound, though not completely. The seizures stopped and her appetite came back. She seemed to be less sore, but still cried sometimes when handled. Also, she was still hopping and lethargic. When I cut the vitamin C back to 50 mg/day, she seemed to deteriorate, so I bumped the daily dose up to 100 mg/day, in addition to feeding her vitamin C fortified food.

After several more trips to the local vet, who doesn't do much guinea pig work, we were getting nowhere. When I asked the vet if they could prescribe some pain med, they just kind of shrugged their shoulders and told me there wasn't really much they could recommend. At this point, I considered having the guinea pig put to sleep.

I researched for hours on-line about post-op pain mgmt for guinea pigs. Putting all of that together, I came up with a regimen that has kept this piggy going, happily for the last 18 months.

The doses are what I've been giving a piggy that weighs about 1 1/2 lbs.

0.1 ml infant's ibuprofen suspension two times a day. Infants' ibuprofen is a 50mg/1.25 ml suspension. I use a small syringe marked in 1/10th ml increments.

100 mg Vitamin C daily. I use Childlife brand Vitamin C liquid, which is 50 mg/ml

The high doses of Vitamin C have a big impact on her mobility. As a matter of fact, after keeping her on the high vitamin C dose for about a year, I ran out of Vitamin C, and by the time I got more (about 2 weeks) her hopping got worse, and she started dragging her back legs again. Within a week of returning to the high vitamin C dose, she was substatially recovered.

When she seems to be doing really well, I reduce the ibuprofen dose to once a day. If she shows any signs of soreness, I go back up to 2 doses for a while. She seems to eat more when she takes less ibuprofen.

Through the course of this illness, this particular piggy has remained small. She lost weight when she first got sick, and went down to weighing a little over a pound. She now weighs 1 lb 9 oz, but her same-age sisters weigh nearly 3 pounds. She's perky and active and my 8 year old son is very thankful to still have her. I am so glad that I tried something on my own, instead of having her put to sleep!

Hope this might help someone else out there...
 

akstrohm

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I'm glad she is in less pain, but pigs should only need about 10-30 mg vitamin C per day. Have you considered going to a better exotics vet? I'm guessing there is some other problem here. Have you tried decreasing the vitamin C slowly?
 

Milkingit

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Long exposure to ultra high vitamin c, then lowering it can cause pseudo-scurvy.

Edit by Ly: Sorry, that site is a breeder site, info and link not allowed
 
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rabbitsncavyluv

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Has she been treated for mites or given an x ray to check for arthritis?

It sounds like she was getting too much vit c at points. What else does she get in her diet?
 

stef603

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Guinea Lynx suggests 50 mg to treat deficiency...the local vet had her up to 200 for a 2 week period, and that seemed to have some positive results. Didn't try weaning her off of the C...Is there a negative effect to prolonged exposure? I know for humans, you can megadose, and your system just eliminates the extra...

I don't have access to an exotics vet where I live. We are in north central PA--farm and timber country, so there are lots of small animal vets, and large animal vets, but no nearby exotics vets. And frankly, I only have so much $$ available to treat her...we love her dearly, but I have financial limits : (
 

akstrohm

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If you give them a lot of vitamin C and then suddenly cut back, it can cause pseudo scurvy. I would try cutting back on the vitamin C slowly, and then cutting out the supplement altogether and just feed veggies (namely bell pepper).
 

stef603

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So am I understanding that too much C could result in scurvy-like symptoms?

I just researched arthritis treatments some more. I think I might try cosequin. This piggy is young, though, so I didn't really consider arthritis.

I'll keepyou posted.

The current C and ibuprofen routine has been working so far, but trying another step to help her even more would be worth a go : )
 

akstrohm

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It's cutting down suddenly on vitamin C that can produce scurvy-like symptoms. If you decrease it gradually, it should help.
 
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