Hi, I've had a pretty much charmed life with my 2 bunnies Tom and Jerry. They're about 15 years old, and have had very few health problems, but a few weeks ago Jerry developed a sore, swollen, watery eye. Vet thought tooth abscess, and gave Baytril and eye drops. 2 days later an abscess burst out of his eye in quite dramatic fashion, which must have made him a lot more comfortable, but 3 weeks later it's still discharging, and he has developed a new abscess on his cheek, and has a swelling on his stomach which I think is also an abscess, as it came up so quickly. Had a bit of an issue with vet, as didn't see same one each time. First vet didn't like long term antibiotic, so stopped the Baytril at end of course even though problem clearly wasn't resolved. Next vet restarted, and said long term antibiotics was pretty much the only chance for a rabbit this age, and to continue for 3 weeks providing he was eating and behaving normally.
So he is eating (we are now damping down their pellets to help the old teeth - don't know why we never thought of that earlier, seems really obvious now!), and compared to how he was before the first abscess burst, he's more like himself. Difficult to say how uncomfortable he is, or whether he is back to normal. He's a very old rabbit, and so he's going to spend a lot of time just relaxing, although prior to the sore eye, he was certainly a lot more active, and our main problem was stopping him from relentless humping of his brother. That has completely stopped now, and he behaves more like Tom, spending much of the day snoozing.
My question is, what hope is there of a good outcome here? Clearly I don't want Jerry to end his very long and happy life with several months of feeling poorly and unhappy, but on the other hand, I want to give him the best possible chance of recovering. I have no experience of rabbits other than these 2, and pretty much no experience of rabbit illness. If he's still eating, is that enough to indicate that it's worth carrying on? I do not think that operating is a realistic option in this case.
Second question - is there really no approved pain killer for rabbits? Jerry has had 2 injections of metacam, but vet couldn't give me anything to take home. Surely managing pain could go a long way to making his life better if it's going to take weeks for these abscesses to (possibly) cure?
So he is eating (we are now damping down their pellets to help the old teeth - don't know why we never thought of that earlier, seems really obvious now!), and compared to how he was before the first abscess burst, he's more like himself. Difficult to say how uncomfortable he is, or whether he is back to normal. He's a very old rabbit, and so he's going to spend a lot of time just relaxing, although prior to the sore eye, he was certainly a lot more active, and our main problem was stopping him from relentless humping of his brother. That has completely stopped now, and he behaves more like Tom, spending much of the day snoozing.
My question is, what hope is there of a good outcome here? Clearly I don't want Jerry to end his very long and happy life with several months of feeling poorly and unhappy, but on the other hand, I want to give him the best possible chance of recovering. I have no experience of rabbits other than these 2, and pretty much no experience of rabbit illness. If he's still eating, is that enough to indicate that it's worth carrying on? I do not think that operating is a realistic option in this case.
Second question - is there really no approved pain killer for rabbits? Jerry has had 2 injections of metacam, but vet couldn't give me anything to take home. Surely managing pain could go a long way to making his life better if it's going to take weeks for these abscesses to (possibly) cure?