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Dehydration

marleyandme

marleyandme

Mama Doe
Hi,

If a bunny is dehydrated (due to stasis) is it normal to inject fluids directly into the stomach instead of giving them subcutaneously?
 
Not sure. I read somewhere once that if a rabbit is in systemic shock that they won't absorb sub-cut fluids properly and so you would need to introduce them via a gastric tube, I have no idea and no experience of whether this is correct but it sounds plausible. I think sub-cut would be the less invasive and preferred route in a responsive rabbit. I expect an I.V drip would be the next stage before inserting a gastric tube, but I wonder how tolerant a rabbit would be to having a catheter left in for the drip?! I guess if pretty unresponsive then they probably wouldn't be too bothered. No doubt a gastric tube would need some sort of sedation?
 
Thanks for your reply.

When my rabbit was in stasis I took him to the emergency vet for fluids, before I knew what she was doing she had injected fluids into his stomach! I assumed the needle was going subcutaneously but she injected them straight into his stomach.

Since then I have tried to find out more about it, but the consensus seems to be to inject subcutaneously? He was very responsive and the reason she gave for the IP injection was that it was quicker for him.
 
Blimey?! Really! Perhaps that is current practice, i've never experienced it though, every episode of stasis we've had we've had sub-cut fluids from a variety of emergency vets. Am sure she knew what she was doing tho....
 
prettylupin said:
Blimey?! Really! Perhaps that is current practice, i've never experienced it though, every episode of stasis we've had we've had sub-cut fluids from a variety of emergency vets. Am sure she knew what she was doing tho....
Click to expand...

I hope she knew what she was doing! I haven't heard of it before either in rabbits. Marley passed away later the same day...we moved to a much better rabbit savvy vet, she spotted the reason for his stasis..his teeth, he had a dental but didn't recover from the anaesthetic. I keep replaying it over and over and am just trying to find out more info.
 
I'm sorry to hear about your loss, that's really sad:( Sometimes with stasis/bloat and all the best care in the world you can't save them. The only complication I could imagine from injecting directly into the stomach would be a risk of infection and peritonitis ? (but I have little knowledge of rabbit medicine, only human!)
Poor Marley:(
I doubt it is much consolation but I think a lot of us have had bad experiences with dodgy vets. We took our first rescue bun to a supposed rabbit savy vet who 'clipped' his teeth when he presented with what we know now are stasis symptoms! AND gave him his VHD (Cylap!) all at the same time. When we came home not surprisingly he had bloat the same afternoon and not having a clue what it was we just thought he was stiff from the vaccine! He survived all by himself and to this day we have no idea how, poor little man. He is our repeated bloater and we are so lucky that so far he has pulled through each time with lots of tlc, still can't believe what that vet did! We were lucky to find a great vet after that and did LOADS of research like you. Don't blame yourself for Marley:(
 
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from what my vet told me, once the liquid is inside the body, it will be absorbed by the body w/i hours. So I never heard of direct injection in the stomach before
 
It is awful being left with "what if" questions due to bad vet advice :(. I honestly dont have a clue, and i dearly hope you find the answers you need.

Please dont be making yourself feel bad with "what if's" though, they can eat away at us, and Marleys passing was not your fault. It really annoys me when vets give the wrong advice, a lot of us have experienced that first hand and it is awful :(.
 
ShazzaBunny said:
It is awful being left with "what if" questions due to bad vet advice :(. I honestly dont have a clue, and i dearly hope you find the answers you need.

Please dont be making yourself feel bad with "what if's" though, they can eat away at us, and Marleys passing was not your fault. It really annoys me when vets give the wrong advice, a lot of us have experienced that first hand and it is awful :(.
Click to expand...

Thank you.

I can't help thinking that I missed the early signs of his dental problems because we had just bonded him with Bella and his behaviour had changed when he was with her (the first I noticed was when he refused to eat his breakfast). The vet that we take our pets to now thinks he had some sort of weakness in his heart and that was why he didn't recover from the anaesthesia, she didn't do a post mortem as I was so upset and she didn't want to ask me. Looking back it would prob have been a good idea to the PM, but I was in such a mess that it never entered my mind. You're right I do have to try to stop thinking about the what ifs.

Jane-thank you for the links

xxxx
 
PM does not always tell the story. PM can be inconclusive due to a no. of condition of the body. So you could pay for the PM and get nothing
 
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