Incontinence

One of my rabbits, Fred (7yrs old, male, neutered) seems to suffer from incontinence. He's lost some weight, his tail got wet sometimes.

All this started in december, because I was worried (although the symptoms were very minimal) I took him to the vet for a general healthcheck in January. The vet thought he was fine, a little skinny but fine.

A few weeks after that I caught him with a wet tail three days in a row, so I took him back to the vet (another vet this time though) again, on Februari 14. They took an x-ray and they checked his blood, all fine.* We also checked his urine for infections/blood, nothing. We figured it must be E. cuniculi then.. But after 2,5 weeks of treatment, he only got worse, now he's got a sore hock. Beside the weightlos he's not showing any other symptoms, he appears to be fine.

What other options do we have? My vet is looking into incontinence in rabbits now, maybe it's just his age.. And she said this is a common problem with neutered dogs.. She's contacting some collegues and checking her books.

*The x-ray did show a mass in his chest. I started this thread about it. I know incontinence can be caused by pain too, so I am keeping that in mind. But I must say, Fred is a rabbit that can't handle pain very well usually. He stops eating very easily when he's in pain. We were planning to do some further tests on this mass after the treatment for EC..

Aaw so sorry to hear about Fred. Unfortunatly I'm not experienced with elderly buns, just that Dolly had Cystitis (wet tail), she was on antibiotics, I did notice a big difference though by leaving a bowl of water down rather than the bottle and I added a small amount of grated apple to encourage water consumption, I also watched her veggies (high calcium ones)...re sore hock...plenty of soft bedding, ensure nails are clipped, plenty of excercise too will help, I use the foam matting from B n Q £12.95 for 4 large ones which interlock, I find this fantastic flooring for sore hocks, Oscar is much much better now
I don't know if that is of any use to you but didn't want to run from the thread....I hope you can get some answers soon for Fred.

As well as EC has the vet run tests for kidney failure?

parsnipbun said:

As well as EC has the vet run tests for kidney failure?

Click to expand...

Yes, they tested his blood. Kidney, liver, everything was fine. I have the results somewhere here but it's all in Dutch. She did save some blood to run tests for EC but since it only proves he's carrying the parasite, not that it's causing him problems, we decided not to test for that. Two of my other rabbits have had EC in the past and it's very likely Fred is carrier too.

@lildebs: Thank you for your respond!! Since one of my other rabbits got calciumrelated problems I'm very strict when it comes to the calcium intake of all my buns. I don't believe you should cut out all the things that are high in calcium (since they do need calcium, not enough can cause serious problems too) but I do know exactly how much their intake is.

The sore hock is caused by the urine and I'm afraid the only thing that will really help is treating whatever causes the incontinence. Feline is quite sensetive for sore hocks so I know how to treat it but treating it won't make the problem that caused the sore hocks in the first place go away, and that's my main concern..

ETA: THe results from the bloodwork.

TE (60-80) 74 GPT(>80 U/l) 39, Creat (<180): 111Ureum (5-12):5.6)
gluk(5-7):7.4

Vet said they looked fine.

@ Lildebs, why encourage waterconsumption? I forgot to mention, but Fred is already drinking quite a lot and certainly more than he used to. (200ml/24hours + veggies, about 300 grams.. He should drink about 75/150ml but closer to 75 because of the veggies.)

I know you should encourage waterconsumption when there are calciumrelated problems such as sludge in the bladder but we ruled that out by taking an xray. But can it be helpfull with other things too?

I had an elderly bunny who *appeared* to be incontinent. However, it turned out that she was simply very, very inactive and was sort of weeing where she sat and then not bothering to move. This caused lots of wetness around the rear-end and ultimately, urine scald and sore hocks. I had to keep her on vetbed so that she wasn't sat on anything soaking wet and changed it frequently.

Hmm, it could be part of the problem here but I don't think that's explains everything with Fred. The inside of his hindlegs are.. Unclean too. I don't think that could come from just sitting in your own urine.





(These pictures were taken last week, I already started treating the sore hock when I took it..)

Update: We finished the 28days of Panacur last friday and Fred will be on painkillers for the next two weeks to see if the incontinence could be caused by pain.

Painkillers seem to have no effect at all. Tomorrow it's the big day for Pip, she'll be spayed then and Fred is coming with her so the vet can see him again..