M
mactep
Guest
Our Mishi (a female rat) is pretty sick for more than 2 weeks now. She is about 16 months old. She is our first pet rat, so we are not very aware how the things are supposed to go. We love her very much and want to do what is best for her, so we are open to ideas and propositions.
We have been to the vet clinic several times, but you know how most vets are when it come to rats. Rats are not very popular pets around here, so our baby didn't get much attention. Sorry I cannot give more specific information about the drugs they gave her but the veterinarian wasn't very explanatory. However he was the only one we found how who had some experience with rats. They diagnosed her with respiratory infection and started a therapy with antibiotic injections + supplement injections every 24 hours. We have done this for about 10 days. She get a bit better and most of her symptoms disappeared. However, during this 10 days, she lost a lot of weight and at some point stopped eating and drinking water.
She is barely walking and it is very hard for her to stand on her legs. So we visited the vets again because we were very afraid that she is dying. They said that the breathing is much better and the infection is gone. The problems with her heart. From what we managed to get (as I told you, the doctor isn't very explanatory), infection has affected the heart and she is having a cardiomyopathy. They injected her with some meds and prescribed 1/8 pill of Vetmedin (Pimobendan) and 1 drop of Vitamin B Complex once a day.
We are treating her with this for 4 day now but it didn't look that she is improving. She is extremely weak now. She is barely walking and it is very hard for her to stand on her legs. She don't eat and drink anything even from our hand. She is not eating solid food for about 2 weeks now, but we give her some yogurt and other soft foods during this time. We plan to start syringe feeding her from tomorrow. The other problems is that the last few days she have a lot of porphyrin around her eyes.
From what I see, she wants to live. She is grooming herself constantly. It is pretty hard for her sometimes because she falls, but she is smart and managed to adapt, using he cage walls as support. She often gets out of her house and walks around the cages (2 weeks ago she didn't want to get out, so we have progress here). When we get her out of her cage, she is going around exploring with interest. However we are not getting her much, because the vets told us that every movement is hard for her and costs her a lot of energy.
So what do you thing about our case? Any ideas what we can expect?
How long is the recovery process from cardiomyopathy after the treatment we are applying?
Do we need some other meds?
What we can do to speed up the recovery?
How much water should we give her with syringe and on what intervals?
How much food should we give her with syringe and on what intervals?
What foods we should give her? We plan to give her yogurt (feeding her this for last 2 weeks), mashed potatoes (she loved it before getting sick), ground vegetables.
I have read that rats love baby food. Do you mean baby formula?
Should we take her out of her cage to walk and play with us?
We have been to the vet clinic several times, but you know how most vets are when it come to rats. Rats are not very popular pets around here, so our baby didn't get much attention. Sorry I cannot give more specific information about the drugs they gave her but the veterinarian wasn't very explanatory. However he was the only one we found how who had some experience with rats. They diagnosed her with respiratory infection and started a therapy with antibiotic injections + supplement injections every 24 hours. We have done this for about 10 days. She get a bit better and most of her symptoms disappeared. However, during this 10 days, she lost a lot of weight and at some point stopped eating and drinking water.
She is barely walking and it is very hard for her to stand on her legs. So we visited the vets again because we were very afraid that she is dying. They said that the breathing is much better and the infection is gone. The problems with her heart. From what we managed to get (as I told you, the doctor isn't very explanatory), infection has affected the heart and she is having a cardiomyopathy. They injected her with some meds and prescribed 1/8 pill of Vetmedin (Pimobendan) and 1 drop of Vitamin B Complex once a day.
We are treating her with this for 4 day now but it didn't look that she is improving. She is extremely weak now. She is barely walking and it is very hard for her to stand on her legs. She don't eat and drink anything even from our hand. She is not eating solid food for about 2 weeks now, but we give her some yogurt and other soft foods during this time. We plan to start syringe feeding her from tomorrow. The other problems is that the last few days she have a lot of porphyrin around her eyes.
From what I see, she wants to live. She is grooming herself constantly. It is pretty hard for her sometimes because she falls, but she is smart and managed to adapt, using he cage walls as support. She often gets out of her house and walks around the cages (2 weeks ago she didn't want to get out, so we have progress here). When we get her out of her cage, she is going around exploring with interest. However we are not getting her much, because the vets told us that every movement is hard for her and costs her a lot of energy.
So what do you thing about our case? Any ideas what we can expect?
How long is the recovery process from cardiomyopathy after the treatment we are applying?
Do we need some other meds?
What we can do to speed up the recovery?
How much water should we give her with syringe and on what intervals?
How much food should we give her with syringe and on what intervals?
What foods we should give her? We plan to give her yogurt (feeding her this for last 2 weeks), mashed potatoes (she loved it before getting sick), ground vegetables.
I have read that rats love baby food. Do you mean baby formula?
Should we take her out of her cage to walk and play with us?