Misaligned teeth but they aren't overgrown?

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FattoRatto

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Hello all! I am new to the forum. I have two 1 1/2 old ex-lab rats, sprague dawley, named Lulu and Lola :)

About a week ago I let them out to play and noticed Lulu's mouth was hanging open. Not only that but her jaw was crooked, like she had dislocated it. When I gave her a treat she could still chew it but did so very gingerly and sort of jerked her head as she did so, so it seemed to cause her pain/discomfort. The next day her mouth was no longer hanging open or noticeably crooked but she was still chewing weirdly so I set up a vet appointment. (I would've done so the day before but it was too late at night)

I brought her to the vet and they said it was odd because her jaw was clearly misaligned but they did not see any overgrown teeth. Therefore they said it was likely either a hidden abscess or some sort of fracture but we don't know for sure so I've been giving her both an antibiotic and pain med. Has anyone heard of this before or had experience with it? I can't find anything online. I wonder if she really did dislocate her jaw. I have no idea how she did this to herself if it is an injury. She has lost weight but other than that and the chewing strangely she acts totally normal.
 
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I would say an abscess is a good guess. Since the teeth aren't overgrown it probably means that they have not been misaligned for very long. So it is probably an acute issue.
 
Thanks that makes sense since she's only had it for a week! I hope the antibiotics will help to clear it up.
 
hopefully the meds will help and she will soon be feeling better.

You didn't mention it but hopefully you are providing her with soft foods to eat ...... such as rat blocks soaked in cool water to make mush, organic soy infant formula thickened with baby cereal, cooked grains like quinoa or oatmeal, and soft vegs like cooked and mashed sweet potatoes, carrots and peas.
 
I've done soft veggies and fruits daily yes. It's hard to find other things because she's so picky, like she doesn't like yogurt and I tried giving her black beans and she didn't like those either. She's not a big fan of soft foods for some reason, she rejects most of it. Weird because her sister doesn't mind.
 
Update I think she is doing better today after several days of treatment! I purchased those blocks of food and soaked them and put a particularly mushy nectarine in there and it's only been 1 day and nearly the entire bowl of "rat cereal" has been devoured! I don't see it hidden anywhere either. Lulu has always had a habit of sitting by the food bowl and just eating until everything was gone and she stopped that when she got her wound but it seems maybe she was back at it again! A big chunk of nectarine is gone too. And today when I have her her medicine on a treat she seemed to gobble it down really fast & enthusiastic instead of slowly while jerking her head which she was doing before.

Oddly she has a sort of long dangly dark string looking thing hanging out of her mouth. I am hoping it is just nectarine peeling and not something more morbid.

Anyways I hope these are all signs she is on the mend! I don't know what the prognosis is for a mouth abscess but it seems she is recovering.
 
So update this morning when I gave her a treat before I had given her her pain meds I noticed she was still eating very slowly and jerking so I believe the pain meds were making it look like she was improving when really she was not :(

Told the vet this at her follow up appointment today and we ruled out an infection so she definitely somehow injured her jaw. I bought a month's supply of pain meds for her and am now feeding her the mushy cube diet and hopefully she heals on her own! I would not be able to afford corrective surgery unfortunately so if it does not heal it is likely I will just have her on mushy food and meds the rest of her life. Poor baby 😭 I did learn about and purchase pet insurance during this incident though so that if something like this happens again I will be able to afford it. So at least I learned something from this.
 
Oh sweet. I looked for insurance and couldn't find any that covered rats. Who did you buy from?

I had one with bad teeth and she had to eat mush for the most part. I just put some in twice a day for her and there was usually still some left in the bowl as I guess the other rats preferred a crunchy meal.

What pain meds are you giving now?
 
Med is Meloxicam. The insurance is Nationwide's Exotic Pet policy. It's only 8 bucks a month for up to 7,000 bucks of coverage for medical expenses a year. You pay a copay of 50$ any appt you have then they reimburse you for 90% of whatever the bill was, so if I had had insurance previously, it would have changed a $3000 surgery into a $300 one which I could have afforded.

The vet tech recommended it to me because she has a ton of rats and their vet bills got extremely expensive for her until she got the insurance apparently.
 
Nice. I'm glad you were able to get the insurance. I have insurance on my cat and it has been the best decision after some unexpected medical needs came up.

If you think the pain is not well handled, see if you can't get her on some tramadol in addition to the meloxicam.
 
I assume it is $8 a month for each rat?
Can you cancel at any time?
Does it cover all meds?

If so, it might be good for people who have only a couple of pets
....... and might be a way to get cheap spays and neuters for those who rescue and have large numbers (if you can cancel at any time)
 
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I don't know about the cancellation policy. They said they covered everything except pre-existing conditions so I believe they would still cover spay and neuter. I haven't received the big packet with all the info yet so I'll have to look more into it when I do and I'll update you guys. It is 8 bucks for each rat.

I think the meloxicam is just fine, she has already gained back almost all of the weight she lost. Her jaw I noticed is still slightly crooked so I don't think she's totally healed yet.
 
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