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Facial abscesses

loubylou85

Young Bun
Yesterday I spotted that Olly my 3 and a bit year old lop eared buck house rabbit has a lump just below one ear, and just above his jaw joint. Given that he loves being rubbed behind his ears, I spotted this quite easily. I was concerned so managed to arrange a visit to the vet this afternoon. My husband has taken him along and the vet has confirmed that he has an abscess and painted a potentially grim picture. She has taken a sample from the abscess for cultures and should be contacting us again this evening / first thing tomorrow morning with more info and recommendations on what treatment they could try. Initial searches on the net are providing mixed information and as soon as I have finished typing this I shall be searching old threads on this forum (so apologies if there is loads of info already on the forums!).

As thus far Olly has shown no signs of discomfort, and no obvious signs of it having affected his appetite and ability to eat, I am hopeful that he will have the best chances for recovery. Much of what I have read on the net refers to bunnies with massive lumps on the sides of their faces which affect their eating patterns and their ability to open their eyes. Olly's is nowhere near this stage as the lump is perhaps the size of a small marble and when I apply some light pressure does not cause him to show signs of being painful.

The warning from the vet that often bunnies do not always recover from facial abscesses may be quite true or may be them warning us of the worst case scenario to prepare us just in case. To date they have been great when treating our bunnies and guinea pigs and I've always understood them to be a well respected local training college (Elizabeth Smith Vetinary Centre @ Shuttleworth College in Bedfordshire if anyone knows them) so I do not doubt their ability to give good animal care. However, my husband and I are currently devastated at the news (he is and always will be my baby boy) :cry:

Can anyone give ANY info about facial abscesses or their bunnies experiences of them...good or bad?

Thanks
Claire
 
Have just read the good info on abscesses in the rabbit care reference section on the forum - which although has me better informed - still doesn't alleviate my fears. If anyone has info about their own experiences, I'd be grateful to hear about them.
 
On the other forum I'm on, there's a member whose rabbit had a jaw abscess that went down to the bone. She printed off some articles we gave her on Bicillin (injected penicillin) and the vet agreed to try it. With that and surgically cleaning the abscess as far as possible and oral antibiotics, she is making a good recovery. The bone even appears to be healing which is rare.

I am aware that it's really hard to get injected penicillin for rabbits in the UK, but I think someone mentioned that some vets will get it for you anyway? The other good option is a bead with antibiotics on it that is put inside the abscess. I know someone else who had a good experience with that for a tooth abscess.

If it's possible, and especially if the direct antibiotic methods aren't available, definately go for surgery. Removing the entire capsule of the abcess is much better than just having it opened up and cleaned out. My vet prefers surgery for abscesses whenever it's physically possible.

I hope Olly heals soon!
 
i know ow you are feeling i am due to take my bunny to the vets tomorrow with an absess on his face. On the other hand i had a rabbit like this last yr and he is doing fine
 
Hi Claire

Sorry to hear about Olly. Abscesses are really horrible and difficult to get rid of but there are success stories - my rabbit, Benny has been abscess free for 2 or 3 months which is good going as it is/was a particularly bad one. That's not to say it won't come back but he is a picture of health at the moment!

We have tried most treatments available, some more successful than others. I'm more than happy to send you the details if you want to know more about them.

Take care

Vickie
 
I have had 100% success rate with treating facial abcesses. I have read a few posts on here before where people have had to have the rabbit put to sleep but this is often the case where the vets are not using the right treatment. Baytril for example (most common used antibiotic) is useless for almost any facial abcess. For the bunny to have the best chance of recovery it is usually best to have the abcess surgicaly opened up and cleaned. Daily flushing of the wound combined with a course of either Engemycin or Duphapen (injectable penicillin) are very good at clearing them up. I have had bunnies with facial abcesses where the infection has gone right into the bone, with the correct treatment as above they recovered exceptionally well and the infection has not returned. It is important while administering antibiotics or penicillin to use a probiotic at the same time as well as pain relief such as metacam or rimadyl :thumb:

To give you a good example of what to expect. This is Angus when he first developed a large egg sized abcess on his jaw (pics taken after it was surgicaly cleaned) a few months ago

angus4.jpg

angus1.jpg

angus2.jpg


and this is him just a couple of weeks ago :D
angussept.jpg
 
Thanks for all the info everyone. I was on the phone with my sister-in-law last night as she has had a fair number of house bunnies for quite some time. She lives in Hackney where she apparently has a fantastic local vet who is great with bunnies, no doubt helped by the fact that he apparently has a number of house bunnies himself.

She and I were discussing the location of Olly's lump. A reference book she has (rather more medical than general) shows that buns last teeth at the back of their mouths fall more or less just below their eyes. Ollys lump sits right back above/behind his jaw, just under the base of his ear. What I don't know is whther this means that the abscess is less likely to be caused by a dental problem i.e could it have resulted from a scratch or wound that I haven't been able to spot? He is still looking happy, eating well, and has his usual clear bright eyes.

I'm still waiting for a call back from the vets - will call them if I haven't heard anything by about 10:30 this mornning. My sister-in-law has suggested that if I am unsure about what the vet proposes, she would contact her vets and try and arrange for me to see them for a second opinion.
 
Finally managed to speak to the vet. They haven't been able to ascertain anything from the sample they took yesterday afternoon. The material was so thick she tells me that she cannot clearly see the cells on the slide. She is sure that it is an abscess given everything she can feel / see. She now recommends a long lasting antibiotic injection of Terramycin which she tells me lasts for around 48 hours after which he would require a second.

Because of the proximity of the lump to Olly's ear, and because of the danger of damage to nerves she does not want to operate as a first port of call. If no improvement after the antibiotics she would then look at other alternatives such as surgery.

Spoke to my sister-in-law for any comments given what the vet had told me. She is of the opinion that an abscess containing icky-stuff ought to be best cleaned out - which would seem to be much the view of many forums and articles I have read.

My sister-in-law has asked me to email her a photo of Olly with the location and sizing of the lump marked on the pic and she is going to run around the corner to her vet and have a quick chat to him.
 
Hi there,

Alice has just been operated on for an abscess at the base of her ear (last Fri). Originally, we thought it would be able to removed as a whole but this wasn't the case as it was attached and inside her ear canal. They have opened it up, cleaned it out and I'm now having to wash it 4 times a day with Hibiscrub to clean the wound and keep it open so it can heal from the inside.

Alice seems to be coping well with having her wound scrubbed even though it causes her obvious pain at the time. I don't think she's in constant pain because she is eating well and still running round the garden. I am giving her one drop of Metacam a day, but have just asked if I can increase the dose for her.

The vets are waiting to get the results back from a swab they took so we can use the correct antibiotics. At the moment I'm injecting her with Baytril but we hope to swap to the correct one as soon as we know.

Previously Alice had an abscess behind her eye and this cleared up very quickly once they'd operated. This was about 18 months ago, so she has been abscess free for a while. This new one is on the opposite side of her face, so I doubt the two are connected.

I would say that abscesses are treatable if they're not connected to the bone. From what I have read, there is a poor prognosis for bone abscesses. However I believe with the right treatment and support for your bunny, you can give them a good quality of life.

I hope this has helped, since the ear abscess sounds very similar. Alice has stopped eating a few times and it was put down to lack of fibre rather than any infection. There was no shaking of her head or anything like that, in fact I wouldn't have noticed it if it wasn't for getting the vets to check her ears because she seemed to have gone deaf!!

How long do abscesses need to be kept open - does anyone know? It's quite distressing having to hurt her, even though I know it's doing her good.

Gemma
 
loubylou85 said:
Finally managed to speak to the vet. They haven't been able to ascertain anything from the sample they took yesterday afternoon. The material was so thick she tells me that she cannot clearly see the cells on the slide. She is sure that it is an abscess given everything she can feel / see. She now recommends a long lasting antibiotic injection of Terramycin which she tells me lasts for around 48 hours after which he would require a second.

Because of the proximity of the lump to Olly's ear, and because of the danger of damage to nerves she does not want to operate as a first port of call. If no improvement after the antibiotics she would then look at other alternatives such as surgery.

Spoke to my sister-in-law for any comments given what the vet had told me. She is of the opinion that an abscess containing icky-stuff ought to be best cleaned out - which would seem to be much the view of many forums and articles I have read.

My sister-in-law has asked me to email her a photo of Olly with the location and sizing of the lump marked on the pic and she is going to run around the corner to her vet and have a quick chat to him.

Terramycin is oxytetracylin, same as Engemycin so he is on the right drugs at least. I would agree with your sister in law it being cleaned out.

Gemma - the wound needs to stay open until all the puss has cleared :thumb:
 
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