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Desperately need advice, Video added.

B

Becki xX

Warren Veteran
At my wits end now. This is Dylan, taken about five minutes ago. On her bad days, she is sneezing well over 100 times an hour. We've been back & forward to the vets, and all they'll give is baytril. It doesnt work. Shes a happy, otherwise healthy rabbit - but surely this is drastically affecting her quality of life? I dont know what to do anymore :cry:

 
Oh poor girly. She is so beautiful :love:

It must drive her to distraction.

I am sorry I am not experienced/knowledgeable in any way with this but wondering if she can be allergy-tested at all? I know this sounds strange but could she be allergic to the hay (though I dont know what you'd do if she was)?

Could you try a different vet for a 2nd opinion?

Could your vet contact a specialist for advice?

Hope you get some answers soon. x
 
We are going to a specialist as a total last chance saloon at sorting this for her, or at least managing it. I dont know what to push for though. We've had second & third and even fourth opinions, all of which havent been interested & said 'its just her'. Im sorry but they are not the ones who have to watch her like this every day, with a knot in their stomach because they dont know what an earth to do to help her. :(
 
Awww poor bun :(
Is your vet rabbit savvy?? How long has she been like this for? Im surprised hes kept her on Baytril when its clearly not working, Id be expecting him to have tried other much stronger abx, or combination of abx if this has been going on for a while.
Having said that this could be Pasteurella which I understand can be very stubborn and needs prolonged aggressive treatment with a strong antibiotic, so it might be a game of waiting.
If shes producing a discharge when she sneezes Id be inclined to get a sample of it onto a cotton wool bud, put it in a sandwich bag (or similar) and take it to your vets so he can culture it and find out what particular infection it is. Then it can be treated much more efficiently.
Im glad shes eating, drinking and lively, these are great signs :)
Sorry i cant be much help, I dont know much about this except for that at the moment my bun Mimi has an ear infection possibly caused by Pasteurella, and its proving extremely stubborn to erradicate.
Im sure someone who knows more about it will be along soon xxxxxxxxx
 
Becki xX said:
We are going to a specialist as a total last chance saloon at sorting this for her, or at least managing it. I dont know what to push for though. We've had second & third and even fourth opinions, all of which havent been interested & said 'its just her'. Im sorry but they are not the ones who have to watch her like this every day, with a knot in their stomach because they dont know what an earth to do to help her. :(
Click to expand...

Gosh :shock: it must be so hard for you watching her have that all the time. Really sad that each vet you have been to hasnt been interested, it seems obvious that it is a persistent problem which needs further investigation (from a novice's point of view anyway!).

Hope the specialist can give some better advice and suggestions for investigation/treatment. x
 
Aww poor Dylan, I've no idea either really apart from an allergy maybe? Joes allergic to woodshavings which is apparently quite common so maybe it's something in his surroundings? If he's indoors maybe air fresheners something like that or outdoors his bedding? has he always been like this or has it just come on? Hope it can get sorted soon x
 
Does she have any other symptoms of the snuffles other than the sneezing, e.g. snotty nose, running eyes? If it is the snuffles then a nasel swab may be able to determin which antibiotic will be most effective. Baytril obviously isn't working. There are a number of different antibiotics that can be tried but they may actually be for children e.g. septrin & if they are not rabbit savey then they may be a bit unwilling to try them.

If she has no other symptoms then she may have an allergy, possibly dust from hay or even "hay fever". Try swapping her hay from the dust free hay company and if you keep her on woodshavings then swapping to carefresh/megazorb/wooden pellets etc may be better. You could also try an antihystamine but that would only be on the recomendation of a vet.
 
Poor thing, it must be so uncomfortable for her. My parents' bun, Hazel, is allergic to Megazorb. I hope the specialist is able to help her. You could always post your location to see if someone can reccommend a good vet in your area.
 
Poor girl. When Teddy was sneezing my vet tried him on a couple of weeks on Baytril which didn't help. He never had any discharge from nose or eyes. After that he was out on a low dose of a steroid for a few days to see if it was allergy related. His sneezing cleared up out of the blue a few days later -we never found out what caused it but it hasn't come back.

I assume the vet has done a full examination of the nose and mouth? Is she moulting?
 
Just looked at your video and we had a rabbit called Keegan who was just like this for sneezing and on one visit to the vets she pulled out a long hay strand out of his nose with tweezers and he stopped sneezing straight away.
I'm not saying it is the same as Keegan but worth having the vet just check.
 
Aaaaaaw poor Dylan, she actually sounds a little wheezy to me too, have they ruled out a respiratory tract infection. We have a huge German lop here at the moment who had a similar problem to this for months going from vet to vet, snuffles was ruled out, popped along to see our vet and she landed up on Depocillin(?) and is almost cured of it.
 
Hello :wave:

I don't have any great advice for you - but wondered how long Dylan has been suffering with sneezing?

My bunny Pickle started having dry sneezing fits last summer. Vet didn't know the cause but suggested the usual things like stop using woodshavings etc. I know that it can be distressing watching them sneeze violently, though Pickle never sneezed as much as Dylan is. I could never work out what caused it, as there wasn't a pattern. Baytril didn't work for him either.

Once we had got to Autumn and the weather had cooled, the sneezing stopped and Pickle went for MONTHS without a sneeze, until last Friday, when he was out in his run on the grass and gave one little sneeze. I can only assume it is an allergy of some sort, like hayfever. Our new vets said as much when I mentioned it a while ago.

I don't know if there are any tests bunnies can have for allergies, that's what I'll be asking if Pickle starts sneezing like that again.

Sorry for the long post :oops: I really hope you get somewhere with the specialist, vibes to Dylan too. I'll be interested to hear how you get on.xx
 
Why not send a link to this video and a history of treatment to the rabbit clinic at Bristol Vet Hospital to ask their advice?
 
have nasal cultures been taken? cytology and bacterial tests can show which anitibiotics work best on the particular bacteria growing, also allergy tests could be done have you treid changing the bedding type or area she/he is in? anoher thing is a second opinion from another vet. septrin is another antibiotic that can be used against paasturella but a test is best to find which strains of bacteria are present adn what they are best ebaten by again as someone else said also do x rays to check tooth roots arent causinga discharge leading to sneezing and check for hay up nose!
 
Thank You for all your replies. Every vet she has seen (two completely different practices) point blank has refused to even consider anything but baytril. She needs something different. It could be an allergy but it isn't seasonal as she has been like this (although has good/bad days) since we had her. No-one has suggested cultures or X-rays, one vet told me not to keep taking her back and that they didnt want to see her for at least three months :shock: Im not some crazy vet-obsessed lady, these two are very, very rarely there! I will absolutely take all these suggestions into account, It feels a breath of fresh air just to read about paths that can be taken. Thanks so much XXX

ETA- No discharge from eyes, but she does sometimes get thick clear or white snot from her nose.

holidayhutch said:
Aaaaaaw poor Dylan, she actually sounds a little wheezy to me too,
Click to expand...

She is very wheezy Lynne.:(
 
Last edited:
Becki xX said:
Thank You for all your replies. Every vet she has seen (two completely different practices) point blank has refused to even consider anything but baytril. She needs something different. It could be an allergy but it isn't seasonal as she has been like this (although has good/bad days) since we had her. No-one has suggested cultures or X-rays, one vet told me not to keep taking her back and that they didnt want to see her for at least three months :shock: Im not some crazy vet-obsessed lady, these two are very, very rarely there! I will absolutely take all these suggestions into account, It feels a breath of fresh air just to read about paths that can be taken. Thanks so much XXX

ETA- No discharge from eyes, but she does sometimes get thick clear or white snot from her nose.

She is very wheezy Lynne.:(
Click to expand...

How rude of your vets!! They cant just refuse to see somebun because they dont know what else to suggest! I could understand if there was really nothing else to be done but 10(ish) people on this thread have all suggested other possibilities!! :? Poor you.
 
How frustrating for you :( Whereabouts are you, maybe someone could recommend a vet who will help you to try and get to the bottom of this. It sounds to me as if there's no point persisting with the other vets if all they will do is give baytril and tell you to go away.

I would also suggest x-rays and culture and cytology tests. If they sedate her for x-rays they could do a nasal flush and send the contents for both culture and sensitivity to see if they can grow any bacteria/test what antibiotics would work, and also cytology which can identify whether there is anything indicating allergy up there. Santa's cytology identified eosinophils (allergy response cells) and inflammatory tissue, hence we are now using antihistamine and metacam to try and tackle both of these. I don't think there's any point trying to take a 'swab' yourself, for one thing all that comes out the nose is dead bacteria and pus, so you are just as likely if not more likely to be picking up bacteria from your own handling of her. It needs a proper sterile sample taken from deep in the nasal cavity either by a deep swab or from a flush.

Good luck, I do hope you manage to get some answers xx
 
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