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Head tilt advice

maxbun

Warren Scout
One of my rabbits, Lynx, started with head tilt just over a week ago. He's on panacur, metacam and ronaxan at the moment, and had a steroid injection at the vets on Thursday. I am aware that this can be a long term problem, but what I would like to know is when the condition will stop getting worse. His head tilt seems to be getting slightly worse each day . He is getting very stressed when I syringe his medicines and then seems to have trouble righting himself. Millie will take her panacur on a dandelion leaf, but Lynx eats all the leaf around the panacur!

When he is out in the run he is still eating the grass and hopping around with Millie, although spending more time than usual lying down. Any comments would be appreciated.
Jane
 
Hope he gets better soon. It is a long recovery process I am afraid cannot advise when it stops getting worse. Wesley had headtilt and it took him a long time to get back to normal. I was very lucky with Wesley as he doesn't appear to have any tilt now.
 
Sorry to hear your bun is so poorly with head tilt. I have no personal experience but understand that it can take a long time sometimes for improvement and you just need to hang in there and be patient. Some buns I have heard deteriorate before they improve.
As far as the medicating goes you are just going to have to be firm and calm on that one. Wrap bunny in a towel if he is a real struggler and maybe sit him on your lap low to the ground so that he doesn't feel so dizzy when you pick him up, maybe even medicate him by putting him between your kneeling legs on the ground itself. If the room is spinning it can be quite distressing, so any movement to a head tilt bun is going to feel quite frightening.
I personally find the panacur 10% liquid easier to administer than the paste in the tube. You can fit a 1ml syringe much more easily into a bunny mouth. You can buy the 10% liquid panacur online, I use http://www.vetuk.co.uk/worming-prod...panacur-10-x-100ml-liquid-for-cats-dogs-p-175
It works out a lot cheaper than endless tubes :)
 
I'm really sorry to hear about Lynx :( Headtilt is awful & can be really upsetting for bunny mums to deal with :(

The main thing I think is to try to remain as positive as you can through this because a lot of bunnies can & do recover :)

We've have a head tilt bunny called Wilson & he started to be poorly on 2nd April last year. We tried baytril, metacam, then steroid injections, stemitil (which is a human anti sickness drug), penecillin, panacur for 6 weeks - then finally switched him on to a drup called Zithromax. The last drug isn't licenced for use in animals as it's a human abx, however bunny mad lisa on here gave me the link for a website called On The Wonk. Her bunny & another had been successfully treated, so we decided to give it a go. For us it's really helped Wilson - he still has a bad tilt on his head, but he's happy living with his partner Alice & although he still has a few rolling episodes - it's nothing like it was when he was really poorly. He now doesn't have any meds what so ever.

There's a thread below about Wilson's illness, which has loads of advice on it from other forum members & what we did - hope this helps. Warning though it is very long - as it was also about 2 other poorly buns we had at the same time.

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

This is how Wilson looks today - still with a wonky head, but 1 year since he became poorly & he's doing just fine bless him :love: Just got a different view of the world ;)

DSCF4140.jpg


If you want to ask me anything further about Wilson's illness, feel free to pm me :)

Hope your little bunster gets well soon xxx
 
DON'T GIVE UP!!

I know how hard it can be caring for a bun with headtilt and a number of vets we took our bun Buttercup to were of the opinion that she wouldn't make a full recovery so it would be best to let her go - I'm so glad we didn't!!

Two months down the line she's back to 'normal' and although still on metacam daily as prescribed by the vet even this too will be reduced from next week onwards.

I would suggest the 28 day dose of panacur for all your buns, metacam or equivilent for the bun with EC as this helps not only with any possible pain but also with the inflamation in the brain that EC causes (hence the headtilt I think) and also bleaching out the cages / runs / hutches / dishes etc with one part bleach / nine parts water to kill the EC spores that I believe can live up to 30 days outside of the body. I poured boiling water on the water bottles etc as I didn't like the idea of bleaching them - I'm sure though someone more savvy will be able to tell you how best to deal with these.

Our vet has also suggested we treat our buns with another 28 day dose of panacur in 5-6 months as precautionary. I will willingly do this as Buttercup was so ill I thought many times she would either die in one of her rolling episodes or would need to be PTS.

Hang in there!! :wave:

Best wishes

Ruth
 
Thank you all for your replies. Not having a good day today. Went out to check in the shed this morning and Lynx looked really sorry for himself, just lying on his hay. I considered taking him down to the vets, but thought I'd put him on the grass in the sun for a while. This has really perked him up again - he seems much more mobile when he is outside than inside, although I'd read they are better in the dark than the sun. He's hopping around, as best he can, with Millie, eating grass. I'm just taking one day at a time.
 
DON'T GIVE UP!!

Just wanted to echo this. Mischa had EC at age 1. There was a strong chance he was going to have to be put down. He's coming up to 4 now and shows no visible signs of having had the illness. :)

I hope Lynx starts feeling much better soon.
 
DON'T GIVE UP!!
Our vet has also suggested we treat our buns with another 28 day dose of panacur in 5-6 months as precautionary. I will willingly do this as Buttercup was so ill I thought many times she would either die in one of her rolling episodes or would need to be Pts

I thought if you had, had a bun with it then you was advised to treat them with the 28 day course, after 3 months again, and then carry on with the panacur every 3 months for the normal 9 day course
Thats what my vet has advised anyway, as unfortunaltely I lost one of mine to it 18 months ago he had a sever head tilt and didnt even surviive the 28 day course poor little thing, and we then thought Charlie may have it as he went slightly head tilted nothign major though so did the 28 day course for him and my other one, and got told repeat it for 28 days just in case, then every 3 months for Charlie, SKippy can do the normal 6 months, but I'm gonna stick with 3 months, as a vet nurse we was talking to did hers every 3 months, missed it by 3 days and her rabbit got it and died :(

I hope your rabbit is ok :)

Bunny addict, Wilson is a very lovely looknig buny :love:
 
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