Mites Is a skin scraping necessary?

[Camerafreak]

My vet is charging me 21 dollars to have a skin scraping to see if Archie has mites. I don't see any bugs like fleas of lice in his fur so the only thing left is mites, right? I guess I don't see the point in a scin scraping if I know its mites. Is there a need for this?

 

[pinky]

If mites are suspected and they have the symptoms, I treat for mites. The skin scrapings are painful and don't always show something. If it's something like a fungus, the vet will use a blue light to detect it.

 

[Camerafreak]

Does scratching, losing hair, and having tiny white and brownish flakes in his fur a sign of mites or a fungus? From what I know its mites.

 

[Shauna&Kerri]

If mites are suspected and they have the symptoms, I treat for mites. The skin scrapings are painful and don't always show something. If it's something like a fungus, the vet will use a blue light to detect it.

I agree, the skin scrapings are painful, and don't always show something. I took both my piggies in to see the vet at the beginning of June right after I got them. I didn't know better, and I let the vet do a scraping. The poor babies screamed when the vet did the scraping! I felt horrible and I was glad my son wasn't there, because he would have probably freaked out at the vet for hurting his pets! Both piggies had bald spots, so I knew something was wrong. It ended up that they both had ringworm, so they were treated for that. They were never treated for mites, because the vet said that the scraping showed no mites.

So I (mistakenly) thought that they couldn't have mites. For the past month now, my piggie, Shauna has been biting whenever we try to hold her. She bites hard! I even took her to the vet and she bit the vet, but mites was never even brought up. Also, Kerri has never liked being held, and when you pick her up she will wimper. So now I think they both probably have mites and I gave them their first Ivermectin treatment today. I will do 2 more over the next 2 weeks, and hopefully that will help them. From what I have read, as long as the dosage is correct, treating a piggie that doesn't have mites is not harmful to the piggie. It is better than not treating a piggie with mites!

As for the blue light, I guess not all vets have that. My vet gave us the ringworm treatment to start, but had to grow a culture for 4-5 days to show it was actually ringworm.

 

[KDonohue]

I am really glad I saw this thread! I didn't realize how painful skin scrapes are! I guess I could have guessed from the name. Anyway I also suspect my pigs have mites. If They are showing signs of having mites and I treat and it turns out to be something else is the treatment harmful?

 

[Shauna&Kerri]

From all the research I have done on the subject, as long as the dose is correct, it is not harmful to treat a pig for mites if they don't actually have mites. The harm comes from over dosing, that can be toxic to the pigs and could potentially kill them. So do not treat them yourself unless you completely understand the dosing instructions and follow it exactly! Guinea Lynx has very detail instructions on the subject and you can give topically or orally, depending on the type of medication you buy.

https://www.guinealynx.info/ivermectin_treatment.html

https://www.guinealynx.info/ivermectin_topical.html

https://www.guinealynx.info/ivermectin_oral.html

 

[Shauna&Kerri]

Both piggies had bald spots, so I knew something was wrong. It ended up that they both had ringworm, so they were treated for that. They were never treated for mites, because the vet said that the scraping showed no mites.

I was re-reading what I wrote here and I wanted to clarify that they had the bald spots before I took them to the vet, not from the skin scrapes! I didn't want people to think that I was saying the vet scraped them bald! Although it was still very painful for them.

She scraped around the bald areas and also pulled out a few hairs and put those in a culture. I don't know how they checked the scraping for mites, as they took it into the other room...

 

[sdpiggylvr]

Don't allow the scraping. There's no need to thrust pain and discomfort on a pig when the symptoms are indicative of mites. It would be much more humane to treat for mites with Ivermectin and if no improvement shows, rule that out. Scrapings infrequently show the mites, anyway, so why waste money on that? Request Ivermectin treatment for symptoms of mites instead.

Good luck!

 

[Ly&Pigs]

More often than not you get false results from skin scrapings, not to mention they are very painful for the pig. Treatment can be given if suspected mites are present and it won't hurt them if they do not have them. If you suspect mites, treat and the problem does not go away or gets worse, then it may be another parasite or a fungus. If in doubt please see a vet just ask them to please not do a skin scraping. They can do sticky tape test which just pulls a few hairs out by the roots with tape and test for mites that way too.

 

[Karsluma]

I had the vet tech tell me that the skin scraping did NOT hurt the pig b/c "only a few layers of skin are removed" - this was on a pig who was covered in open sores. Since no vet was there, I just kept telling the guy that I didn't want a skin scraping and if the vet felt that it could be mites, we should just treat. I was fine treating for something else if the vet suspected a different parasite/fungus, but no skin scraping - the tech was SO annoyed! But they didn't do one, didn't charge me for an office visit, and treated all my pigs with ivermectin, antibiotics, and probiotics - tomorrow they get dose 2 of Ivermec.

 

[Nicolene]

I have to say that I was very annoyed by my vet's wife, also a vet in the practice, who was so quick to do a sticky tape test ($45), skin scraping ($75) and ringworm ($75) I didn't manage to deny her. I wish I had. Tux didn't make a sound or flinched, so I'm not sure what he felt. We wanted the ringworm test, to be sure, as it can spread to humans and other pets. However, almost $200 later all the tests came back negative and she treated for mites, which I already told her it was. I won't have another app with her, her husband is amazing though and would have asked and explained about every test. So, if you KNOW it's mites, treat that and make sure to treat the other pigs too. The only good thing we got that day was extra meds for future use and a handwritten note for dosages for different weights. From now on I'm treating for mites first and going from there. I'm just too scared to treat them myself.