Isabell aka winry's abscess is back with a vengeance!

So when winry came out of her igloo earlier I noticed her abscess has gotten bigger and is about to burst open....I have not a clue what to do. My husband suggested he lance it but we are afraid the 28 gauge needles are to small to suck the puss through....I am really hoping it holds off till the morning but any suggestions on how to treat it if it does decide to pop?

Don't try and pop it. If it has a scab then I would soak it and gently pick off the scab to release the pus. Once you've squeezed out as much as you can you will want to rinse it with a saline solution (you might need a syringe for this). If not apply warm compresses a few times a day to draw out the infection and it will form a scab. I would recommend putting her on abs just to be safe but in my experience your best bet is to just keep draining the abscess until the infection is all out.

Edit: If you have a good rat vet then you could take her in and have them lance it and clean it out really well and then just continue the rinsing and draining at home.

I am not touching it lol there is no scab..all the red in the picture is where her skin is literally stretched to max and tearing layer by layer I didn't even give her antibiotics tonight because we have to force them and there is no way to hold her without the abscess being squeezed a bit..she fights tooth and nail to keep from taking her meds....I am going to take her in the morning and have the vet drain it again and hopefully this time it won't come back.....

Aww poor girl Once the vet drains it you will need to keep the hole open and keep flushing it so it can heal from the inside out and doesn't come back.

Hoping she doesn't just drain it with a needle again...I will mention the other method to her so we can get this healed up for her.

Yeah it needs to be opened up so that it can continue to drain, and be flushed with saline or diluted betadine etc.

The vet only aspirated the pus out last time? Oh dear.

She is at the vet now waiting to have it drained and luckily this time the vet is going to open it a bit and drain it and then she said she would would show me how flush and all that fun stuff So now I just play the waiting game once again for the phone to ring so I can go get her....Probably won't be till this afternoon.

It isn't as bad as it seems. After a while you will be a abscess flushing expert.

Joanne said:

It isn't as bad as it seems. After a while you will be a abscess flushing expert.

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Once you get past the smell its all good LOL

Rat owners develop all sorts of medical skills out of necessity

I will drive a rat 45minutes to my vet before I dare mess with a nasty lol so no you dont always develop it haha

Well the draining didn't go quite as planned...The vet had to end up cutting out some of the tissue so we now have stitches...I will keep giving her the antibiotics but I get the feeling that this thing is not going to go down without a fight...On top of that, while we were gone earlier my dog decided to hurt his leg so we might end up at the emergency vet for him tonight haha..This is not my year! I tried to get a picture for you guys of her incision but the supposed to be groggy/sleepy rat is actually wide awake and ready for the world...

Is there pus in her ear? Those awesome little LED flashlights are wonderful for seeing things like this.

I have one on my phone well my husbands phone...I don't think it is. Right now she is crashed out in her igloo but when she wakes up I will give her a good look over and let you know.It has been a long day!

lilspaz68 said:

Is there pus in her ear? Those awesome little LED flashlights are wonderful for seeing things like this.

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Are you thinking Zymbal's Gland tumor?

Joanne said:

Are you thinking Zymbal's Gland tumor?

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No as its too far back for ZGT, but was worried it was in the "tubes" as such...and the abscess had spread.