Chronic Sneezing and Boogers?!

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This topic has 4sd replies, 3 voices, and was last updated 7 years, 1 month ago by Bunny House.

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- 01/10/2019 at 1:25 PM
  Ello
  Participant
  3 posts
  Hi! My bun, Dwayne, developed what appeared to be an upper respiratory infection in June (he has had these before, so I wasn’t too concerned–I took him to the vet and he went on antibiotics). He took his antibiotics for the full round and was fine for about a month. But then in the beginning of September he started sneezing again, this time with thick white discharge. I took him to the vet and he was prescribed another type of antibiotic. He went through that round. But two months after that appointment, he started sneezing the boogers again! So I took him to the vet again and again they gave him yet another antibiotic! And only a few weeks after he was done that round, the sneezes came back and the boogers came back.
  
  So I obviously don’t want to go back just to get another round of antibiotics, since those didn’t work and antibiotic resistance is a problem! A close friend of mine who fosters bunnies told me that one of her former fosters had chronic sneezing issues, and that she thought that’s what Dwayne had. There has been no change in his food/hay or environment for the past year and a half so that is probably not the issue. He is eating, drinking, pooping and peeing fine and is his usual self (in fact, yesterday while he was having dinner he was battling a booger in between bites of dandelion!)
  
  My foster friend told me she thinks it sounds like a chronic thing and nothing a vet can do anything about. However, as a concerned bunny momma, I want Dwayne to be the healthiest he can be! I know that sometimes dental issues may cause respiratory infections within the sinuses, but I’m also concerned about taking him to the vet for imaging because if that’s not the problem, I’d feel really bad putting him through that stress for nothing! Like many bunnies, he hates the vet, and he’s been there so much already.
  
  Sorry to have made this so long! But has anyone experienced a similar issue with their buns and if so, what did you do about it?
  
  Thanks!
- 01/10/2019 at 2:19 PM
  Ello
  Participant
  3 posts
  I forgot about one thing– my boyfriend smokes cigarettes, luckily not like a chain smoker but he does use tobacco every day. And we started dating in April so I wonder if thirdhand smoke on his clothes or on my clothes after being with him could have anything to do with Dwayne’s respiratory issue, since that didn’t start until after we started dating. Does anyone have any experience with thirdhand smoke (the particles and dust that settle on your clothes/hair etc after smoking) and their buns’ health?
- 01/10/2019 at 3:06 PM
  Bam
  Moderator
  17029 posts
  Respiratory infections in rabbits are notoriously tough to cure. You often need to have the bun on antibiotics for several weeks. The causative bacteria are very good at hiding in the nasal/sinus cavities, they can go into a dormant stage and most antibiotics only kill bacteria that are actively dividing. Meaning when the symptoms are gone and the bun appears healthy, there are still bacteria lurking in moist, warm places and they “wake up” from their dormancy when the antibiotics are gone from the system. Sometimes you have to switch to a different kind of antibiotics or combine two antibiotics for treatment to be effective. Injections with penicillin G sometimes work (penicillin can only be given as injections to rabbits, never orally). In some cases the best you can do is treat with antibiotics when there are flare ups.
  
  Several types of bacteria can cause respiratory infections in rabbits, and there’s one called pasteurella that is carried by a very large percentage of rabbits, but only some rabbits get sick from it. Why this is isn’t fully understood, but it most likely has to do with the genes that control the immune system. I’m guessing it’s pasteurella your friend means when she suggests that the infection is chronic.
  
  The boogers rather makes me think this is a bacterial infection, not an allergy or something that just irritates his airways (dust, third hand smoke particles, certain types of hay etc). You should of course try to make his living area as dust-free as possible, because dust is, obviously, an irritant.
  
  Here is an article about pasteurellosis in rabbits: http://sawneeanimalclinic.com/downloads/pasteurellosis_in_rabbits.pdf
  
  Here is another article from The House Rabbit Society. It’s a rather long article and it’s bordering on being a bit heavy, but the HRS is a very good source of rabbit info: http://rabbit.org/pasteurella-its-health-effects-in-rabbits/
- 01/18/2019 at 10:58 AM
  Ello
  Participant
  3 posts
  @bam yeah, I figured it is most likely pasteurella or something similar, but the thing is he’s been on three rounds of three different antibiotics already, and if he’s eating and pooping and acting fine except for the occasional booger, is it worth it to go back to the vet just to get another round of antibiotics? I don’t want his system to become resistant, just in case he needs antibiotics in the future for another illness. I’m really careful about making sure that his living area is clean and dust-free, so as to avoid irritants that make it worse. I feel like my vet is just going to give him another round of a different antibiotic and he’s going to go back to sneezing a few weeks after that’s done.
- 01/18/2019 at 11:20 AM
  Bunny House
  Participant
  1241 posts
  It seems like you might need to do a culture from the nose to determine what bacteria it is and then use a medicine to kill that bacteria, but as Bam said, URI bacteria is hard to eliminate, it’s more of a maintenance thing you’ll have to do
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