Diarrhea My baby is on antibiotics and having diarrhea, help!

marina_ · May 10, 2020

Hi, my piggie (almost 4 yo) has been ill for a few weeks and I'm really worried.

At first he was wheezing and stopped pooping and eating so they treated him with antibiotics. The wheezing stopped and they did an x-ray that showed nothing was wrong except from some bloat.

After 5 days we stopped the antibiotics and he still wasn't eating veggies or pooping normally so we went to the vet again and he did another x-ray, checked his teeth and did a bloodwork. Everything seemed normal but he still had some bloating so he gave him some medicine for the bloat, some laxative to make him poop more AND some antibiotics (i don't really know why he gave the antibiotics but he did). He also prescribed some critical care to make sure he gets everything he needs.
He started pooping again after the laxative but they looked soft and mushy.

So now after 5 days of all this stuff he still doesn't eat much (although it is certainly improving) and poops more too but today he started having really soft poop (although not completely liquid) and I don't know what to do. Should I stop the antibiotics?

Thanks guys!

bpatters · May 10, 2020

Are you giving him a probiotic 60-90 minutes after the antibiotic? That will often help.

But I'd call and ask why he's on an antibiotic? It's not the usual treatment for bloat. And antibiotics nearly always cause digestive upsets in guinea pigs, so they're only given when an infection is present or strongly suspected to be present.

Is this an exotic vet?

marina_ · May 10, 2020

bpatters said:
Are you giving him a probiotic 60-90 minutes after the antibiotic? That will often help.

But I'd call and ask why he's on an antibiotic? It's not the usual treatment for bloat. And antibiotics nearly always cause digestive upsets in guinea pigs, so they're only given when an infection is present or strongly suspected to be present.

Is this an exotic vet?

I'm not giving him any probiotics and I honestly don't understand why he hasn't recommended them. He is supposed to be an exotic vet but I'm not really happy with what he's doing and I was gonna get a 2nd opinion since he still doesn't know what's wrong with my piggy after 3 weeks.

But thanks for the recommendation I will try to buy some probiotics for him tomorrow! I just hope he'll be okay for the night.

bpatters · May 10, 2020

Do you have another guinea pig? You can syringe your sick pig some poop soup until you can find some probiotic. BeneBac is good if you can find it.

Some vets don't recommend probiotics, while others swear by it. I'm a big believer, because I once had a bout of diarrhea that lasted several weeks, and the thing that finally cleared it up was probiotics.

ItsaZoo · May 10, 2020

I agree the probiotics are a good idea. Antibiotics mess with the gut bacteria and also appetite. My experience is it takes several days after the antibiotics are finished before the appetite and poops get more normal.

I would continue with Critical Care. Is he eating any hay? The fiber in hay really helps to get digestion corrected. When mine was ill she wasn’t too interested in hay. Luckily I had some corn husks that she was still interested in. I didn’t feed too much, but they have good fiber and helped to get her digestion straightened out.

marina_ · May 14, 2020

Update on my little piggie!
He stopped with the diarrhea for a few days and started eating more after getting him some probiotics, now he is more active and definitely eating more veggies and hay but today he started with the diarrhea again and it is worse than last time. It's veeery loose and I'm worried again because he was making so much progress!

bpatters · May 14, 2020

Did you start him back on a full serving of veggies? If a pig has had a digestive upset, the usual thing is to add veggies back one at a time, with 48 hours or so between each new one. Sometimes the veggies can irritate the gut.

I'd stop all veggies, and given that you don't really know why he's on an antibiotic, I'd stop that too. Full-on diarrhea is very dangerous for a guinea pig, and you want to stop it as soon as possible.

You also could feed him Critical Care to make up for the lack of veggies.

marina_ · May 14, 2020

Okay thanks I'll do that tomorrow and see if he improves because I did give him a lot of veggies seeing that he was really interested in them.

Thank you so much for always answering!

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Diarrhea My baby is on antibiotics and having diarrhea, help!

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