Head tilt, your experiences please

Hi I've been reading as much as I can on here and also on the external links and in my rabbiting on too

It looks like a couple of us are in the same boat at the moment, fingers and paws crossed for all of you

I dont want to hijack a thread so I've posted this one

Millie has EC and her head started tilting last Sunday, by the time she saw the vet it was a bit more pronounced, she had a couple of jabs and has a 28 day course of panacur and 7 days of baytril
Cracker had a larger preventative 5 day dose of panacur (no mean feat getting it in him I can tell you!)

Her head has tilted, it gets worse when she's stressed, she had a sort of fit at the vets after the jabs and she sort of spasms when I medicate her, once back with Cracker she calms down and recovers quite well

she is eating, drinking and pooing (not in her tray but I'm not worried about that)

What I'm not sure of is whether to try the other drugs mentioned on here or wait the 28 days to the end of the panacur?

Also will the tilt be permanant or will it ease once the infection is under control?

any other advice would be gratefully received too

Thanks

I've mentioned a few times on here about a guy who is on another forum who has extensively researched EC. This is the general gist of what he says.

EC does not directly cause head tilt. EC batters the immune system, which means the bunny can not fight off things like infections. Head tilt is generally caused by infection (but obviously there are other reasons too), and whilst that might be secondary to EC, it is not EC that causes the head tilt-it is an infection.

He also says that the Fenbendazole does not penetrate the blood brain barrier (those are the words he uses) and so can not iradicate the parasite EC in the brain, thus making it useless in active cases of EC. He has progressed onto using a different drug which is showing more promise, he says.

He also says to treat head tilt aggressively to avoid it progressing further into the ear and then into the brain. For that you will need more effective drugs than Baytril. Your bun will also probably need Metacam. Maybe read Angie65's thread on this page as to more things that are available.

A head can have a residual tilt (depending on the cause and the solution), but it should improve a great deal if its an infection, and is beaten. All rabbits differ with this.


This is Tilly's head tilt story. Not sure if it was be useful, or not, for you, but it may be.


Tilly was seized by the RSPCA officers from someone who was refusing to get her treatment. At that time she lived with a guinea.

When she arrived at the RSPCA they didn't know what to do for head tilt so Panacured her (funnily enough, to no effect). She had a 3-4 o'clock tilt, and arrived in August 2008. After she had been at the centre for two months (and tilted for a great deal more, but the amount is unknown) I fought to bring her home as a foster knowing that I would be willing to try different things with her and fight for her because I knew there was so much more.

The centre thought she needed someone who would mother her, and I sort of thought she needed someone who could stimulate her. I compromised and gave her both. I bought her home and bonded her with Summer (who would definitely stimulate her) and Roger (who is a mother hen), my other two fosters.

I took her to my vet along with a big blurb that Randy (ra7751) had written about head tilt. I wanted Zithromax for her but my vet had never heard of it, nor used it, but picked up on Convenia that Randy had written about and said he had it. I had never considered using it so had to make a spur of the moment decision based on my trust for Randy's info and also my vets ability to treat Tilly[highlight= rgb(255, 255, 136);] if anything went wrong. Thankfully I made the right decision.

The dosage that my vet used for Convenia was as it was labelled (I believe that's what he said). He said it's given to cats by their weight, and that is what he did for Tilly. We started off giving it every two weeks (which is how it is dosed in cats), but it became clear on day 2 it started to work, on day 9 it stopped working (it was easy to see because we were using it for head tilt so we could see the improvement in her head and alspo in how she behaved). We gradually cut down the time in between injections and found that once a week (every seven days) worked perfectly for her and she was kept on that for 2 months of weekly injections. It changed her life.

The hardest thing with Convenia is that because there is a long time inbetween injections if there are any side effects you have to ride the week out as best you can. The risks seem to mainly be gut issues (cecal dysbosis, chronic diarrhoea, etc) and there is not way to stop it once the drug has been injected. With Tilly, we saw no side effects at all. We did use Fibreplex during that time until we were sure that she was going to show no side effects. That is basically giving her additional fibre and can potentially be useful in some gut situations but not others (I personally don't think it should be used in a blockage situation, but in this situation I had no issue with it at all and would use it again).

When Tilly arrived she could go up onto things, but not get back down, when she looked down she would just roll, she didn't move her ears, she couldn't stand up on her back legs and periscope, she couldn't clean one back leg, she couldn't put her head straight and certainly couldn't tilt it over the other way. She had nystagmus (eye scanning) when we picked her up, she would sometimes roll and mostly ran round in circles.

Tilly was on Convenia for two months. Each week me and my vet discussed her improvement and then when we plateaued and saw no further improvement we gave her I think it was three further weeks on the Convenia to consolidate all that we had battled against.

During the time she improved we started to see things like she could clean both back feet, she started to turn and listen with both her ears, she didn't have nystagmus when she was picked up, her head straightened from roughly a 3-4 o'clock tilt to a 1 o'clock tilt to upright, she could just down from things, albeit a bit cautiously sometimes, we never saw another roll after treatment started, she ran faster, jumped higher and we even saw a half binky effort, which was so funny, she could run in straight lines and all sorts. She went from being a disabled buny to a regular bunny but with a funny head because she can now do everything that all other bunnies do.

Alongside all the treatment I gave her physio using pellets and pear (and later a wider variety of food when I was sure what she could tolerate) and also gave her daily or every other day neck massages, and she also liked a heat source to lay her neck on so sometimes I used those too.

A characteristic of Tilly that kept her fighting through it all was the fact she is so VERY stubborn, and boy does she know her mind. That shows now because sometimes she refuses to do something, or believes she can't, so just doesn't try, but now I know it's not due to her head tilt, it is due to her very stubborn nature.

This is Tilly as she is now, 8 months after finished her treatment. The video shows her periscoping (for food), also turning her head the other way (also for food), shows how she sleep, shows how she cleans herself properly, etc. She was very obliging

Oh you poor little girl sorry to hear about her head tilt. As I mentioned on Angie65's thread it is so awful to see - it nearly broke my heart when Wilson was so poorly with it.

I would definitely speak to your vet about trying Zithromax - it's not licenced for use in animals as it's a human abx, but it can work really well. Bunnymad lisa's bun had it, as well as another bun on the On The Wonk website. Your vet might be cautious as it's not licenced for buns, but we felt we had no option but to try it & thankfully for Wilson it's worked He still has rolling episodes every now & again, but he is still enjoying life & loves being with his partner Alice.

We felt baytril did nothing for Wilson :? He was also on stemitil which is a human anti-sickness drug & helped with his rolling, plus streroid injections. The main thing is to make sure that he's somewhere he can't hurt himself if he does roll & can be a good idea to pad a pen / cage out for him with towels etc. Wilson for the first few weeks was confined to a cage padded with a quilt, which was changed 3 or 4 times a day. For us one of the biggest things that helped Wilson, was actually putting him back with Alice, as she is a perfect little nurse.

I also forgot to mention on Angie's thread Wilson was on panacur 6 weeks.

PM me if you want any more info or help.

Hope your little girl will be ok & come through this xx

Here's the thread that Jack's Jane posted about our little fighter.

http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?t=178735&highlight=wilson

I have had three head tilt cases - one serious one not so serious one a EC at birth case.

These were probably before the above discussions on alternative drugs so we relied on panacur for 28 days, Baytril, Metacam and the anti-naeusea drug (sorry in haste so can't recall - someone will know).

One was a 6 yr old nethie with bad tilt, eyes flicking, rolling, etc. After several days he was up and around, after a couple of weeks much much better - then after 6 months fine as ever - and just ever so slightly tilted (about 5 degrees or less). He lived to be 11 years old!

The other a 6 yr old agouti lop 'mix' - lesser tilt - quick recovery on same mix of meds. To this day he sleeps in an odd sort of curved position and if feeling ill will 'tilt'. Now 9 years old

Both were tested for EC and both had it . though as we know so do many!

The last came from a pet shop direct having been reported to me as 'having fits - will be put down'. he was a baby and had 'typical' blindness in one eye and also burst ear drum. We did not bother testing for EC. Treated as before - he recoevred quickly but due to the severe nature - and I believe the delay in treating whilst pet shop dithered - he is still about 5-10 degree tilt and of course still part blind/deaf - he is also brain damaged and seems to have stayed a 'baby'. But is incredibly healthy otherwise.

I also had a chronic EC case with typical blindness, hind leg drag and eventual renal failure. but no head tilt ever.

Copied from an EC & Headtilt group on BunSpace...

My Mischa's head tilt first started on a Sunday morning (16th June). I woke up to my Dad frantic telling me something was wrong with him. Dad had brought him in from his outdoor cage where he used to spend the night to his indoor cage and he was on his side, his head moving from one side to the other and his eyes rolling uncontrollably. Immediately I told Mum to phone up the vets. We'd never been before but a friend had and swore by this particular vets.

We quickly left with Mischa wrapped in a towel cuddled by me to keep him still, although he wasn't moving a great deal anyway. When we got to the vets the vet was lovely, he said it was one of three possible things and that he would start treatment for all three. Ear infection, EC or a brain infection. I think, that day was a bit hazy to be honest! Mischa was given an injection of steroid and the vet gave us some Baytril and Panacur paste and told us to bring him back the next day.

We brought him home. It was heart-breaking to see him barely able to stand and constantly rolling around trying to regain his balance. He was most comfortable laying on my chest, one head propped up on my boob (the cheeky thing). The next day we duely brought him back to the vet where he had a second injection of steroids. The vet told us to come back the next day when Mischa again had a third injection of steroids.

We weren't noticing a change in him at all. But the vet continued persevering. He said a lot of people would have given up by now, hinting at maybe putting him down. We said we couldn't bare to loose him and so the steroid injections continued. Now every two days for a while. After a week the vet said the steroids weren't doing anything but to continue with the baytril and panacur. Meanwhile we researched some alternatives, the main one I remember was to give herbal tea for him to drink, apparently this helps to kill off the parasite. I'm not sure if it worked or not but we tried it anyway. Fortunately he had never stopped eating (he loves his food) nibbling on hay and nice things like banana and raisins.

Once the Panacur had finished we returned to the vets. We were just about starting to see a slight improvement. He was able to sit for a while without rolling over and his head was starting to straighten ever so slightly. However, the vet didn't see this and started talking about putting him down. I couldn't bare to hear her talking like that just when he was starting to show some improvement! So we refused and the vet got us yet more panacur. I fled with Mischa to the car in floods of tears while Dad waited for the treatment. Over the next few days the slight improvment grew and he starting getting much better and almost back to his own self. Finally on the 20th July he had his last vets appointment. By this time he was so much back to his normal self we really needed to have a basket for him! He was active and certainly didn't want to sit for the vet! He still wasn't entirely better but over the next few weeks he improved til he was at about 95% of his healthy original self.

He still has a very slight tilt and a dewlap under his chin. He easily puts on weight and is not as fast or as agile as Mini. But he can still chase her well! He even managed the other day to leap up onto my bed although I think it wore him out as he hasn't done it since! Instead he relies on a box to help him have a step up.

I hope everyone with a head tilt bunny manages to cope with the illness. It is just as hard on the owner as the bunny as it is horrific to see them unable to stand, to sit or even to lay comfortably. You all have my best wishes.

Elena xx

So sorry to hear your bunny has had headtilt. My Wesley had headtilt at the beginning of the year. He kept falling over initially. He was giving an antinflamatory injection, baytril and 28 day course of panacur. They did say his right pupil was not responding and it could indicate brain damage in older rabbits. It did take him quite a few weeks to recover but he is back to normal now.

I have a rescue bun with head tilt - quite seriously. She lives a full and happy life with her sister, who seems to take care of her (and put up with a good deal of flack from her too :lol. I've had the pair for about 2 years now and they're lovely.
Whiskey can lift her head more upright, which she does when out on the lawn, but her muscles have now set and she'll never be right. I have few problems with her - she's a little fighter and I love her to bits

Deb

My little boarder seems brighter in himself, but he's worse physically:? His head tilt is def more pronounced & he wobbles constantly. I was advised 6 weeks panacur, (remembering to to thoroughly clean on day 21 & 28 ), & he's having baytril & metacam & some ear drops cos there was **** in his ears. He's going home Saturday (he's a rescue's bun-not the rescues I usually foster for- & I would love him to stay here - partly cos I don't think the stress of moving will help & partly cos)

Good luck with Millie - It's awful watching them

sorry to hear about your bun,my mother had a foster bun with EC ,Jamie was left with a head tilt after treatment,however she seemed to adapt and coped quite well. Is your bun receiving anti-inflammatories either as an injection or orally? This is an important part of the treatment as it inhibits the bodies inflammatory response to EC and its this that does the damage. I'm concerned your other bun was only given 5 days panacur,I was led to believe it was 28 days if they had been in contact with active EC and 6 weeks if they have clinical signs. The 9 day course is only for worming rabbits so I dont know where the 5 day course comes from.
Good luck and sending get well quick vibes for Millie

Angie65 said:

My little boarder seems brighter in himself, but he's worse physically:? His head tilt is def more pronounced & he wobbles constantly. I was advised 6 weeks panacur, (remembering to to thoroughly clean on day 21 & 28 ), & he's having baytril & metacam & some ear drops cos there was **** in his ears. He's going home Saturday (he's a rescue's bun-not the rescues I usually foster for- & I would love him to stay here - partly cos I don't think the stress of moving will help & partly cos)

Good luck with Millie - It's awful watching them

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Could you offer to take him until he is better? You could maybe get her to talk to your vet about her being willing for you to take responsibility and get the necessary treatments.

Head tilt-your experiences

I would join the forum "On the Wonk" i have just joined and there is lots of info on there (from knowledgable poeple dealing with this distressing illness)
I am sure you will gets lots of help

Sky-O said:

Could you offer to take him until he is better? You could maybe get her to talk to your vet about her being willing for you to take responsibility and get the necessary treatments.

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I have PMd