Abscess Flushing

:wave: everybun - I haven't posted for a while, but we are still around!

As some of you know, Chutney has had a chronic tear duct infection for over two years - nothing fixes it completely, though it comes and goes in severity, sometimes ALMOST going completely. This turned into an abscess suddenly, last weekend, and surgery was performed on Monday. She came home last night, so this morning was the first time I've had to flush it.

Well the difficulty is, I'm not sure how much of a success the abscess flushing was. I bathed the opening, and the end of the syringe definitely went into the hole, as did the saline, but because the abscess was in the tear duct I had expected fluid, or gunk, or something, to come out of her nose (or eye), like when she's had her ducts flushed, which it didn't. The fluid just seemed to swell up the site where the abscess was. I massaged it a little bit, and a bit of fluid came out of the hole, but it's difficult to know how hard to press. When she ran away afterwards a bit of white gunk appeared on her eyelid, which I wiped off, so maybe that's what is supposed to happen.

Can anybody offer thoughts or advice on this please? I used about 20mL of fluid - maybe this is insufficient for it to come out of the nose? Maybe it went down into her mouth instead (then she swallowed it?). Or maybe it's normal to just sit in the space where the abscess was? Are you supposed to massage it or what?

Thanks in advance for any help - I'm feeling a bit hopeless here, and I know some of you have extensive experience with abscesses.

Wendy

PS She's having penicillin, metacam and Bio-lapis, and we go back to my (imo superb) vet on Friday

PPS Sorry this is so long :lol:

Have skull radiographs been taken ?
It may be that elongated tooth roots have caused the problems with the nasolacrimal duct. If so then you wont get drainage and any fluid you put into the cavity will flow back out again. Also, there is likely to be a lot of soft tissue inflammation which would also effect drainage.

If you massage around the cavity before flushing that should loosen up any pus. Then the saline flushing may be more productive. Applying a warm compress over the effected area for a few minutes prior to massage may also be helpful. I'd make the saline warm too.

Brilliant - thanks Jane, I'll try those things :thumb:

It was a tooth root causing the original problems, and the tooth was taken out at the end of August, so maybe a piece of broken/escaped root caused the abscess???

I guess there will be some soft tissue inflammation, but I'm sure the vet nurse said it had flushed through when I collected her last night, so I would really like clear a drainage route if possible. I'm so scared of hurting her though

Thanks again for the tips.

Sorry if the above post confused you - I had to get a new laptop last year.... lost all of my login details, created a new user account and ended up automatically logging in with one user account on my work pc and a different one on my home laptop.......... i confuse myself sometimes :lol: