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Sluggish digestive motility

MichG

MichG

Mama Doe
Poppy had impaction twice over the summer, both times she had intensive treatment and pulled through, since then she has has periods of sluggish motility where her stomach goes hard and doughy, she continues to eat and poo, when she has periods like this she gets supportive treatment of gut Stimulants and pain relief and carries on as normal. Well she has it again today really bad. Took her to where I work and the vet had a feel and thinks it is just sluggish guts so to give her supportive treatment again but to book her in with a more rabbit savvy vet when I can (I work 5 mins from my house and the snow has been horrific here so couldn't get her to my normal vet. She is booked in on Sunday (will get her there before if she gets worse) for a scan with my normal vet. Anyone else had experience of this? How did you treat it and what diet did you feed?

She is well and normal in every other way.
 
Both stomach and caecum in the summer, the lower part of her abdomen is normal at the moment.
In the morning her and Charlie get a bowl of either pellets soaked in loads of water or a bowl of recovery diet depending on what I have at the time to make sure she gets loads of water. They have unlimited hay all day and night and in the evening they get a bowl of veges/herbs or forage.
And I quite often see her drinking from the bowl.
 
I assume she is a Rescue so you may not know if she had the problem before she was spayed ? Post surgical adhesions can cause issues with GI tract hypomotility.

I believe that FHB is of the opinion that some Rabbits who are prone to gut stasis/hypomotility have an abnormal narrowing in their small intestines. I think she made the observation from various PMs carried out on 'stasis Rabbits'.

Another condition that can present as gut hypomotility is arthritis believe it or not. Especially in the hips. It seems that the amount of discomfort the arthritis causes fluctuates and when at its highest level it can effect gut motility even if there are no obvious mobility problems.

Dental Rabbits are also at risk of sluggish guts. Even though they have access to hay 24/7 the amount they actually eat may be insufficient to promote good gut motility.

Does she ever leave uneaten cecotrophs ? Cecal dysbiosis can also cause sluggish guts

Sounds as though your Vet has a nice mystery to try to solve !!
 
Actually she and her partner are the only non rescue buns, they are both nearly 4 and were my first buns before I knew about rescue (they were p@h bought:cry:) she was spayed at 6 months and never had complications in that respect.
Never thought about arthritis being a problem, will definitely get that checked out, she shows no signs of it, but as we all know they are so good at hiding pain.

I never see uneaten decals and her poos are lovely and golden and crumbly and big.
My bunnies always seem to have odd things wrong with them, they never get normal stuff *sighs*. At least I have a very good vet to help sort her out. Just glad she is still eating and pooping a bright and normal!
 
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