• Forum/Server Upgrade If you are reading this you have made it to the upgraded forum. Posts made on the old forum after 26th October 2023 have not been transfered. Everything else should be here. If you find any issues please let us know.
  • Please Note - Medical Advice

    Please keep in mind that posts on this forum are from members of the public sharing personal opinions. It is not a replacement for qualified medical advice from a veterinarian. Many illnesses share similar symptoms but require different treatments. A medical exam is necessary for an accurate diagnosis, without which appropriate treatment cannot be given.

    You should always consult your vet before following any suggestions for medication or treatment you have read about. The wrong treatment could make your rabbit worse or mean your vet is unable to give the correct treatment because of drug interactions. Even non prescription drugs can do harm if given inappropriately.

    We are very grateful to members who take time to answer other members questions, but please do be clear in your replies that you are sharing personal experience and not giving instructions on what must be done.

    Urgent Medical Advice: If you need, or think you might need, urgent medical advice you should contact a vet. If it is out of working hours phone your vet's normal number and there should be an answer phone message with instructions on what to do.

Advice on internal adhesions - treatment and prognosis.

Vegan_Bunny

Warren Veteran
I'm posting up for a friend so bear with me. I have had a search of this but nothing has come up, so feel free to post a link to a thread if this has already been discussed.

A bit of background: My friend's rabbit recently underwent serious surgery to remove an impaction from the stomach. She was suffering from bloat and unfortunately her stomach had to be opened and completely flushed out and a huge amount of hair removed. The rabbit was not expected to survive but against all odds, she recovered very quickly.

Now a few months down the line she's been going off her food periodically. She usually starts eating again after a dose of metacam and emeprid but clearly something is going on. It's pretty certain that she'll have internal adhesions and I just wanted to know if anybody has experience with this and if there were any none-surgical treatments for it and what the prognosis was. I will mention that she had a dental last week to see if that was the problem. She had long teeth but no spurs and today she went off her food again.

Thanks so much for any help offered. X
 
Hi VB lovely to hear from you again. Sadly I have had experience of post surgical adhesions in Rabbits. Two after surgery for an GI tract obstruction and two after a routine spay. My first advice would be never opt for more surgery. IME the same thing always happens, ie more adhesions form a few weeks/months later.

Has your friend’s Rabbit had any diagnostics or is post surgical adhesions a presumed diagnosis ?

What prokinetics are being given ? IME Cisipride is more beneficial than just metoclopramide (Emeprid). Giving prokinetics in response to a decrease in poo output is necessary, even if Bunny is still eating. Ranitidine was another really useful prokinetic but sadly it has been withdrawn from sale in the UK. For both human and animal use. I am not sure if a similar drug called Famotidine might be an option. Perhaps your friend could ask the Vet about that.

https://bnf.nice.org.uk/drug/famotidine.html

Diet wise IME it is best to avoid all pellet/muesli feeds . This diet sheet would be good to try to follow

https://www.harcourt-brown.co.uk/ar...heets/recommended-diet-for-adult-rabbits/view

Also optimising fluid intake, giving water in a bowl rather than a bottle, feeding veg wet from rinsing. IME Rabbits drink a lot more if this is added to their water

https://www.vetark.co.uk/pages/ProC-Professional2.aspx

Minimising the amount of fur Bunny ingests is important, so regular grooming of both the effected Bunny and any Bunny companion they have. Never give cardboard toys/boxes. Bunnies with post surgical adhesions may crave the ‘wrong’ type of fibre and ingest lots of cardboard/ paper. This can easily lead to a blockage.

I think I have covered everything I have learned, if I remember anything later I will edit this post. I really hope that the Bunny will pull through x
 
Thanks Jane. All that info is extremely useful. The bun is on emeprid so hopefully a change to cisaprid can help. She's been fanatically grooming/plucking her so that's covered, although her companion is less obliging to be groomed but I'm sure she'll figure something out. She has not had diagnostics as yet, apart from an xray, which I presume wouldn't show up adhesions. I think she's reluctant to pay for a ct/mri scan since it wouldn't change treatment anyway. I have to agree with her on that.

Xena was on long term ranitidine so I'm aware of its withdrawal and I'm not happy about it but not much we can do. I'll look into the other drug. She uses the same vets as me and they're good at listening and trying new things. X
 
Thanks Jane. All that info is extremely useful. The bun is on emeprid so hopefully a change to cisaprid can help. She's been fanatically grooming/plucking her so that's covered, although her companion is less obliging to be groomed but I'm sure she'll figure something out. She has not had diagnostics as yet, apart from an xray, which I presume wouldn't show up adhesions. I think she's reluctant to pay for a ct/mri scan since it wouldn't change treatment anyway. I have to agree with her on that.

Xena was on long term ranitidine so I'm aware of its withdrawal and I'm not happy about it but not much we can do. I'll look into the other drug. She uses the same vets as me and they're good at listening and trying new things. X
Cisapride can be given alongside Emeprid. I agree re the diagnostics. An X-ray probably wouldn’t show adhesions, I think a CT scan would be needed. Treating symptomatically and making dietary changes is probably the way forward.
 
What is the prognosis do you think? Can she live a relatively normal life? How did your buns fair?

The prognosis is guarded, sadly. Out of the 4 Rabbits I had 2 had corrective surgery which failed and we had to let them go when they both developed second obstructions :cry: After that I vowed never again to agree to corrective surgery and the other two were managed medically with dietary modification, prokinetics and analgesia. One only lived for about a couple of months after her spay, but she had had a previous abdominal op’ to treat a severe abscess that had been left untreated for weeks. ( she was a rescue from a Meat Farm. :cry:). The other Rabbit did reasonably well for about a year, although he did have several episodes of stasis. Sadly the final one we could not get him back from �� Every case will be different though. Your friend’s Rabbit may do much better x
 
Back
Top