Self Injury? UPDATEx2:Mites, but could just be infection?

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M

MomRat

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jul 4, 2009
Messages
948
Location
Johnson City, TN
So, Dominic, our 18 month old who recently lost his brother to PT, has been in the intro process with our other pair of boys and come out on the bad end of a couple of scuffles. Fur ripped out to the point of blood loss, a gash on his shoulder, a gash by his mouth. When these first happened, he exacerbated them considerably digging at the scabs and opening quite a patch on his chin. Intros have since progressed more hopefully, and there have been no scuffles in several days. Somehow, however, he is continuing to exhibit new bloody wounds in these areas, even to the extent of finding new ones since he had a bath yesterday - small open wounds on both sides of his chin, patches of dried blood behind his shoulder blades. Our other pair, who live in the cage his is stacked on, are exhibiting no signs of itching, so we are assuming we can rule out mites. Depression? Just the winter itchies? I have trimmed his nails once every week or so since we got him as a baby, so it can't really be related to that, either. He hasn't developed any abscesses yet but I'm watching him like a hawk. Any thoughts? I can get pictures tomorrow if people need to see them.
 
I would treat them for mites and see if things clear up. If its not mites and you treat....no harm done but you can eliminate that as a possibility.
 
Since it's unexplained, I would go with a mite treatment as well. The areas you describe are classic spots for scabs from mites and lice.
 
So, treat all three? We've never had this before. But, no-one has ever had this caused by depression or dry skin? I was just hoping... =)
 
The stress from the loss could have made him more susceptible to a mite infestation. So you could be half right :)

It's best to treat all three, and if you get revolution it's super easy.
 
So, our vet asked to see them before prescribing, and sure enough, mites. But, I feel like I've seen here on the forums, discussion of revolution treating with one dose, and the mites rats usually get being species specific(ie, they won't go after people or other pets that aren't rats) but whooo boy, the buggies our babies have are NASTY. She let us look at them in the microscope - here's a pretty picture from wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cheyletiella_22.jpg ... they are fully transmittable to other animals and people - guess it's the wrong week to be dog sitting. =/ Also, whether we treated with Ivermectin or Selemectin, she reccommended treating for 3-4 weeks, because we also found eggs, and as the life cycle is three weeks, the treatment today might not kill the ones that hatch in three weeks. Has anyone else encountered this?
 
A second treatment in a month would be safe, but revolution works for a month and should take care of the second hatching no problem.
 
I wonder if the rats got it from the dog in the first place? Mites usually found on our rats are species specific...these ones sure are nasty.

I wonder why your vet doesn't think that the Selemectin which usually remains in the body for a month needs several treatments? If you do opt for several treatments, I'd go with Ivermectin. Ivermectin has been proven to kill these Cheyletiella mites using the 3 to 4 week treatments.
 
Well, we're pretty positive he's had the mites for quite a while - at least since sometime between thanksgiving and christmas - because, as this thread started out, we thought all the scabs he was gaining between intros were where he was digging at his injuries from bites - but looking back, its just been mites and bites - he had way too many scabs on his chin for it to have been otherwise. (The dog has only been with us for January)Ooops. :doh: We'll know better next time.

At this point we're thinking, that we just need to pick up what seems to be everyone else's habit, and get Ivermectin at the feed store, and just treat everyone new that joins our family. Because, our best guess at this point is that these nasty guys came into our home back in the summer when we got Gregory and Quilt. This is because the home we rescued them from, the mom was a groomer, and had TONS of dogs and cats of her own as well as daily handling many other animals. We've just come to the conclusion that they've all had them since then, but because they can have them without showing symptoms because of a strong immune system, it took the stress of losing his brother and an abscess/infection to bring them into full swing on Dominic.

We did go with Ivermectin, simply because since she was insisting on 3 treatments for each of our boys, it was around $20US and the Revolution was going to run us closer to $60 or $75... How spendy is the Rev at the feed store? I know its a paste - what we have is a diluted form of what the vet gives via injection, its a liquid, and $3 a dose still seemed high. :redhot:
 
I'd really recommend that your vet take a look at the dosing instructions for Rev on the pfizer website.... three doses? It is only given once a month....

But, with ivermectin you have to dose once a week for three weeks. So unless she was getting confused on the dosing, or I'm just not reading it properly... and you'll be doing a longer treatment because of those eggs.
 
Sooooooooooooo, it's been about 4-5 weeks now and the boys have been getting their weekly dose of oral Ivermectin. (Their comment, "Woo-hoo! We gets blueberry yogurt noms!") and poor Dom is still getting scabby towards the end of the week, digging at his sides, ears, and face until he draws blood.

Should we just keep plugging away with the Ivermectin or try something else? These buggies just won't go away.
 
I would dose them with revolution.
You would need to check with your vet to see how long you need to wait to dose them since they have been getting ivermectin.
 
Are you sure the ivermectin dose is correct. Once a week for 3 weeks should have done the trick.
 
Well, the Oral Ivermectin they are receiving is the clear injectable which our vet diluted, we don't really know the intensity of it because of that(I'm sure she does), but they are receiving between .19 and .17 ml (depending on weight)once every 7-10 days until scratching subsides. Just to recap, we know for a fact that this is Chyletiella Mange, instead of the mites that Rats normally get - it's a buggy that is normally carried by dogs and is transferrable via humans and most other animals. It can also be carried asymptotically, surviving just well enough to exist on healthy animals without causing symptoms. We think it was brought into our colony by the other two boys, because they were owned by a dog groomer, and it didn't break out until Dominic's resistance was lowered. The eggs are not affected by Ivermectin and therefore multiple doses were required to get everyone as they hatched... She seemed to think the case would be the same with the Revolution, but that could have been an error in communication. We didn't want to do revo because several doses for several ratties was going to get awfully spendy at 2 doses a tube(we have big boys).

Dominic's symptoms seemed to be lessening around week three of dosing, but they have come back with a vengeance. Heavy bleeding and scabbing along his left side and shoulder, a little bit behind his ears... nothing on his chin yet, which he did have back in December, but both he and Quilt are now also sporting a bit of brown crust along the edge of one or both ears, which is a new symptom.
 

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