A spay gone wrong

[Karla]

This post is not about reasons not to spay- AT ALL. I just want to explain the importance of making sure the vet does the surgery correctly.

A good while back, someone I know had their bunny spayed. They called tons of vets in their area, but finally found one a couple of hours away, who is specialised in rabbits and who has done tons of spays.  I haven’t asked the bunny owner if I could post the pictures of what happened, so therefore I will only show one picture and not the rest of the swollen neck. 

 The vet used a catheter in the ear to inject the pre-medication. This is not recommendable at all. Apparently, the needle was too big and also damaged the  vascularization of the ear. This resulted in that part of the area was lost. The ear is still not properly healed, but at least the dead tissue is no longer spreading.

Furthermore, the vet used a tube too large for the bunny’s trachea for the gas anesthesia. This caused inflammation and swelling.  This is very painful. It’s been a good while since the surgery and the throat is still swollen. The bunny was unable to eat for a while and most likely had problems breathing as well.

The correct procedure should have been an injectable pre-medication such as buprenorphine, and then just gas anesthetic administered with a mask, not via intubation.  Intubation is better, but only if the tube is the right size and the vet can intubate without traumatizing the rabbit.  

 

This surgery is done by an experienced rabbit-savvy vet, who has done spays for many, many years. I am merely pointing this out, so everyone concerned with their bunnies undergoing surgery knows about correct and incorrect procedures and knows what to ask the vet.  I have always relied on the fact that when vets say that are experienced in this procedure, then it is done without a great risk, but that is apparently not so.

 

…EDITED…

[bunnymum16]

oh my..poor bunny.

[Sarita]

I guess I don’t really understand what you are trying to say…it sounds as if this particular incident was not usual.

[Lintini]

Ah wow, poor little rabbit. I would have never thought that a vet would put a catheter in the ear? Tell your friend we wish her little miss well.

[jerseygirl]

I hope there is no on going issues for the rabbit. Do you know if Molly has this type of technique done for her spay?

[Karla]

She wasn’t spayed at this vet clinic. But at least now I know what to ask about in the future if I ever need a bunny neutered again. I had no idea about this, and this is why I made this thread – to make others aware of what the best type of anesthesia is and ask for it.

[Sarita]

Okay, I understand now. I was a little confused about what you were trying to say.

[Karla]

I know…things don’t always come out the way I want them. I try to do my best, but English is not my first language. Sorry, if it was not really clear what I wanted to say.

[BinkyBunny]

Oh, how awful. I feel very sorry for this bunny and their owner, but I do hope you don’t feel bad or blame yourself in any way. Thank you for sharing this info though so others can learn from what this owner had to go through — may help prevent this from happening to someone else’s bunny.

[MayaConsuelo]

Well, I have a medical background (although NOT vet medicine) and I think from the post it seems that someone either pulled blood, or injected an anesthesia into the vein that’s in the rabbit’s ear. When I took Mr. Bun-Bun in to be fixed, they mentioned that they could pull blood to run panels (to test for imbalances or disease), but they didn’t advise it since it’s very difficult (and painful for the rabbit) – and this was a vet who was experienced with rabbits, and recommended by the House Rabbit Society. Any sort of respiratory intubation wouldn’t affect the ears like that. If anything it was damaged by a needle that led to infection. When you think about it, to insert a needle into that vein would be very difficult, rabbit’s ears are paper-thin.

I think this post is mainly to advise that people should only go to a vet that’s experienced with rabbits. Rabbits weren’t routinely spayed and neutered in the past, so that’s why a lot of vets don’t have experience – plus from a technical standpoint I’ve heard it’s really tough, my friend who’s a vet mentioned that their skin during surgery is almost like paper… very fragile. So if the vet wants to run a blood panel on your dog who weighs 100 lbs, that is an easy procedure, but drawing blood from a rabbit might be not worth the trouble, because the medicine isn’t as up-to-date like with cats and dogs, and it can cause the rabbit more stress and pain than it’s worth. But house rabbits should be spayed and neutered – just find the right vet!

[Karla]

I think I need to edit my first post, so there aren’t too many misunderstandings It is the story of my life on this forum .

First off, the problem with the ear is due to the anesthesia injected in the ear with a needle – somehow this went terribly wrong and as Dana says, most rabbit-savvy vets won’t do this. For 2 weeks, the whole ear was completely cold, the wound could not heal and it grew bigger and bigger, and they didn’t know if they should amputate the whole ear or not to avoid it from spreading.

Second off, during surgery, the vet used a tube down the throat. The bunny’s throat and neck was completely swollen and still it. She was unable to eat and has been in great pain because of this.

There is no connection between the ear and the throat problem.

BB, Although I am a strong believer in neutering, yes, I do feel bad, because I am the one who told them to get her spayed. No one else. So I am responsible in a sense for all this, because they did go to a rabbit-savvy vet with lots of experience in spaying does. But at least she made it, and now others can learn from this, so they know what questions to ask the vet.

[Beka27]

Wow. What a situation. I wouldn’t feel bad for anything Karla. The end result is the rabbit is now spayed and on her way to healing. It’s unfortunate she had a bad reaction to the anesthesia and intubation, but chances are she may have had the same reaction regardless of what surgery was being performed. She will heal and feel better and life goes on. Many rabbits have torn ears (my lop for one) and they can survive and thrive despite this fact. This may also encourage the vet to learn other techniques and methods that can prevent similar occurrences in the future.

Vibes for this bunny!

[bunnytowne]

Never heard of intubating a rabbit.  Goodness.  I have seen Ruby in the aquarium thing with the anesthesia being pumped in with a tube.  That I believe would be the correct way

Also I wanted a blood panel done on my buns full yearly checkup.  The staff said it is very hard to get blood out of a rabbit.  Since they are young they didn’t recommend having it done and the vet doesn’t normally do it anyways.

Hearing what happened to this bunny I now know that was the best choice was not to do the blood panel.

Sorry to hear this happened to a precious bunny.   Hopefully the vet will learn from this. 

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