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Another traumatic week for Scarlet the superbun!

RedFraggle

Warren Veteran
Now I think we're going to be ok, I'll post.

Poor Scarlet has gotten through yet another crisis. She'd been a bit off for a couple of weeks and had lost 10% of her weight over about 2.5 months. Our vet had been checking her teeth and weight every few weeks but there didn't appear (note choice of words) to be any change in her mouth. She's an old lady now, just over 8 and a half if the RSPCA age was accurate and has had multiple GAs for various problems in her mouth in the 5 years we've had her.

She took a turn for the worse two weeks ago, was cold and a bit flat one morning but picked up with metacam and metaclop. I booked her in for an earlier check up than planned. She wasn't right but wasn't really doing anything that screamed "vets now" and was eating (just not as well as usual) and pooing. Our vet didn't like the feel of her tum and thought he could feel a lump so we agreed to take her back to Crab Lane (FHB's old practice) as they do all her "important stuff". I didn't think she was coming home again, she's been through an enormous amount of GAs and treatment already, we didn't want anything invasive done if there was a gut problem and we thought this time was "it".

It was, of course with it being Scarlet, her mouth. It always is, she never presents correctly symptom wise. Continues to eat, doesn't drool, nothing you can see easily with an otoscope. Her remaining two teeth on her LHS had started to break away (common in end stage dental disease) and were sharp and she also had a spur on the "good side" of her mouth where she still has all her teeth that was digging in. She should not have been eating and she should have been drooling constantly. She stopped in for 3 days, came home Friday and has been steadily recovering over the weekend. Last night she ate everything in her run and she dived into her breakfast this morning with very unscarletlike gusto.

That's GA number 15 done and dusted and another hurdle jumped. Her lungs aren't quite right, they think she has some scarring from a resp infection when she was young but they haven't changed in 2 years and she did the GA like a trooper. Her kidneys are fine despite being on metacam for about 3 years now. She has an advanced cataract in one eye, artritis in her spine that has fused vetebrae in two places and no teeth at all on one side of her mouth now but she just gets on with it.

There are a couple of reasons for posting this essay........... 1. Old buns can and do cope well with anesthetics with the right veteriinary care. 2. Rabbits do not always present as they should and vets need to look outside the box a little. 3. You can't and will never see inside a rabbits mouth properly without an aneasthetic and 4. Never underestimate a rabbit!
 
Oh wow, what a brave little star your Scarlet is (I bet Frances is missing her, I sensed she had a soft spot for your wee girl) . Really pleased she is back on good form.

I totally agree with your sentiments about how well rabbits can cope under GA - my Noodley didn't have quite that many GA's but not far off & despite having a million health problems she bounced back every time. She was also under Frances / Crab lane :)

Thanks for your inspiring post & nose rubs for your girlie
 
Now I think we're going to be ok, I'll post.

Poor Scarlet has gotten through yet another crisis. She'd been a bit off for a couple of weeks and had lost 10% of her weight over about 2.5 months. Our vet had been checking her teeth and weight every few weeks but there didn't appear (note choice of words) to be any change in her mouth. She's an old lady now, just over 8 and a half if the RSPCA age was accurate and has had multiple GAs for various problems in her mouth in the 5 years we've had her.

She took a turn for the worse two weeks ago, was cold and a bit flat one morning but picked up with metacam and metaclop. I booked her in for an earlier check up than planned. She wasn't right but wasn't really doing anything that screamed "vets now" and was eating (just not as well as usual) and pooing. Our vet didn't like the feel of her tum and thought he could feel a lump so we agreed to take her back to Crab Lane (FHB's old practice) as they do all her "important stuff". I didn't think she was coming home again, she's been through an enormous amount of GAs and treatment already, we didn't want anything invasive done if there was a gut problem and we thought this time was "it".

It was, of course with it being Scarlet, her mouth. It always is, she never presents correctly symptom wise. Continues to eat, doesn't drool, nothing you can see easily with an otoscope. Her remaining two teeth on her LHS had started to break away (common in end stage dental disease) and were sharp and she also had a spur on the "good side" of her mouth where she still has all her teeth that was digging in. She should not have been eating and she should have been drooling constantly. She stopped in for 3 days, came home Friday and has been steadily recovering over the weekend. Last night she ate everything in her run and she dived into her breakfast this morning with very unscarletlike gusto.

That's GA number 15 done and dusted and another hurdle jumped. Her lungs aren't quite right, they think she has some scarring from a resp infection when she was young but they haven't changed in 2 years and she did the GA like a trooper. Her kidneys are fine despite being on metacam for about 3 years now. She has an advanced cataract in one eye, artritis in her spine that has fused vetebrae in two places and no teeth at all on one side of her mouth now but she just gets on with it.

There are a couple of reasons for posting this essay........... 1. Old buns can and do cope well with anesthetics with the right veteriinary care. 2. Rabbits do not always present as they should and vets need to look outside the box a little. 3. You can't and will never see inside a rabbits mouth properly without an aneasthetic and 4. Never underestimate a rabbit!

Do that at your peril !!

Scarlet is a Starlet :love:

What a relief that she is now doing so much better :love:
 
There are a couple of reasons for posting this essay........... 1. Old buns can and do cope well with anesthetics with the right veteriinary care. 2. Rabbits do not always present as they should and vets need to look outside the box a little. 3. You can't and will never see inside a rabbits mouth properly without an aneasthetic and 4. Never underestimate a rabbit!

To add with my 20+ years of experience of hundreds of rescue and foster buns -

Not all older (or even younger) buns cope will with anaesthetics, especially repeated anaesthesia and it must be evaluated on a case by case basis.

Vets certainly need to look outside the box, and sometimes more than a little :D

Vets can and do see inside a rabbit's mouth whilst conscious as they use the very same tools to do so as they would if anaesthetised. I have also seen this myself and all the teeth, gums and cheek tissue can be seen.

Admittedly the conscious dental debate is devisive, but where a rabbit's life is at stake and a vet won't perform a dental under anaesthetic because of the serious risk to that rabbit, I am not prepared to let a rabbit suffer/die for the sake of *not* doing a conscious dental.

Glad to hear Scarlet is doing well :D
 
To add with my 20+ years of experience of hundreds of rescue and foster buns -

Not all older (or even younger) buns cope will with anaesthetics, especially repeated anaesthesia and it must be evaluated on a case by case basis.

Vets certainly need to look outside the box, and sometimes more than a little :D

Vets can and do see inside a rabbit's mouth whilst conscious as they use the very same tools to do so as they would if anaesthetised. I have also seen this myself and all the teeth, gums and cheek tissue can be seen.

Admittedly the conscious dental debate is devisive, but where a rabbit's life is at stake and a vet won't perform a dental under anaesthetic because of the serious risk to that rabbit, I am not prepared to let a rabbit suffer/die for the sake of *not* doing a conscious dental.

Glad to hear Scarlet is doing well :D

To be brutally honest, and apologies if this offends some but, I would sooner put Scarlet to sleep or risk a potentially lethal GA than have her jaw clamped open and restrained conscious to fully check her teeth. I appreciate others opinions differ but to me it would be akin to torture both mental and physical. As you say MM it's a devisive topic and everyone must make their own choice.
 
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For anyone interested in the type of equipment a Vet would need to use in order to obtain a full view of the inside of a Rabbit's mouth this image shows the use of Incisor gags, cheek pouch retractors and a tongue depressor (the Rabbit in the image was under GA)

 
To be brutally honest, and apologies if this offends some but, I would sooner put Scarlet to sleep or risk a potentially lethal GA than have her jaw clamped open and restrained conscious to fully check her teeth. I appreciate others opinions differ but to me it would be akin to torture both mental and physical. As you say MM it's a devisive topic and everyone must make their own choice.

I totally respect your opinion RF.

When you have a healthy bunny who is an anaesthetic risk, it's very difficult to let them go for the sake of 2/3 minutes of being uncomfortable.

I get many PM's from people who are in this position who want me to recommend vets to do a conscious dental because their own vet won't do any more because of the health risk.

The beauty of it is that the rabbit is not traumatised afterwards and gets on with life and eating. That for me says it all. If there was a prolonged physical or psychological recovery then I would certainly be thinking twice.
 
Do you know if there has there been any research like monitoring of stress hormones via bloods to assess whether the rabbits are psychologicaly impacted MM?
I would question whether they are traumatised afterwards without that given how they hide things (and Scarlet's "poker face" is pretty impressive). Does your vet trance them or literally just do it?
 
Ok, I have even more respect for you for replying to me the other day, especially since you've been going through so much with Scarlet - who, by the way, is one amazing bun!! I'm sure you knew that already though! ;)

Thanking for posting this, I'm feeling a lot more optimistic now!

I hope Scarlet continues to recover and tell life who's really in charge, just like she's already been doing! :D
 
Ok, I have even more respect for you for replying to me the other day, especially since you've been going through so much with Scarlet - who, by the way, is one amazing bun!! I'm sure you knew that already though! ;)

Thanking for posting this, I'm feeling a lot more optimistic now!

I hope Scarlet continues to recover and tell life who's really in charge, just like she's already been doing! :D

Lets put it this way, I dont think I'd argue with Scarlet ! :shock:

:lol:
 
For anyone interested in the type of equipment a Vet would need to use in order to obtain a full view of the inside of a Rabbit's mouth this image shows the use of Incisor gags, cheek pouch retractors and a tongue depressor (the Rabbit in the image was under GA)


How can you possibly put that gag in the mouth of a conscious rabbit without them being terrified? I know I couldn't cope with it and I would know what was going on!
 
She's definitely in charge. We were supposed to be in the Cotswolds on holiday last week. That's the second time we've cancelled a holiday on her account, lol. We managed two nights in the tent at Harrogate instead (which is just 20 miles away) and camped at a site about a mile from the vets she was in!
She sulked with me for three days for offering her fresh mint several years back now. I have never seen a rabbit look so disgusted!! I got the look, then she turned on her heels and flicked her feet at me and refused to acknowledge my existence for three days. How dare I offer mint instead of parsley without her express permission! I'm fairly certain her attitude is a big factor in her survival. Goodness only knows what her life was like before she was at the RSPCA but they were 9 months fixing her up and she'd only just gone up for adoption when we took her.
 
She's definitely in charge. We were supposed to be in the Cotswolds on holiday last week. That's the second time we've cancelled a holiday on her account, lol. We managed two nights in the tent at Harrogate instead (which is just 20 miles away) and camped at a site about a mile from the vets she was in!
She sulked with me for three days for offering her fresh mint several years back now. I have never seen a rabbit look so disgusted!! I got the look, then she turned on her heels and flicked her feet at me and refused to acknowledge my existence for three days. How dare I offer mint instead of parsley without her express permission! I'm fairly certain her attitude is a big factor in her survival. Goodness only knows what her life was like before she was at the RSPCA but they were 9 months fixing her up and she'd only just gone up for adoption when we took her.

Well really, what do you expect if you book a holiday without first consulting The Boss :roll:

:lol:
 
There were several reasons we bought a decent tent to have camping holidays, one of which was the £600 we lost on the cotttage booking 2014combined with the £375 vets bill and the two day last minute booking at a hotel in the Lake District for £160 to go to instead so we would only be an hour and a half away. Campsites are only about £20 a night so cancelling them is less financially traumatic (and in fact they were good enough to transfer our booking to September at 5 days notice at no extra charge). Do I need to pin up a letter in her shed formally notifying her of the September dates do you think or does that just gve her a target to develop more tooth/mouth randomness by?
 
There were several reasons we bought a decent tent to have camping holidays, one of which was the £600 we lost on the cotttage booking 2014combined with the £375 vets bill and the two day last minute booking at a hotel in the Lake District for £160 to go to instead so we would only be an hour and a half away. Campsites are only about £20 a night so cancelling them is less financially traumatic (and in fact they were good enough to transfer our booking to September at 5 days notice at no extra charge). Do I need to pin up a letter in her shed formally notifying her of the September dates do you think or does that just gve her a target to develop more tooth/mouth randomness by?

Hmmmmmm, well perhaps it'd be a good idea for you to book an appointment to speak with her about whether she will allow you to pin a letter to her shed first. She may do you for Fly Posting !! :lol:
 
:lol:

Conscious dentals always divide the crowd!

Your laughter feels somewhat belittling! Disagree with me all you like but please don't trivialise how I feel. I'm genuinely horrified at the thought of doing that to a conscious rabbit - does your vet seriously put the gag in the mouth of a conscious rabbit to do the dentals?
 
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