Help with bunny – gi stasis, kidney enlargement (x-ray help!)

[bunnygal]

Hi everyone,

I am hoping for some help regarding my rabbit Harchie. He is over 9 years old (we dont know his exact age as he was adopted). He is a very funny guy with tons of attitude and likes to talk (grunt!) to show you he is boss. He has one eye because when they found him it was super infected and they had to remove it so the infection wouldn’t go to his brain. He could care less though because he runs at top speed and loves to jump!

Well poor Harchie is going through an episode of GI stasis. He has had this before and it took him a week last time until he was 100% back to normal. Sunday he started the typical doesnt want to eat (not even treats!), isn’t pooping, seems off. Also loud stomach gurgling noises (gas) and laying down. Started him right away on Simethicone and cisapride. Started him on force feeding. He wants to eat his greens (lettuce, cilantro, dill). Gave him some buprenorphine.

Monday went to vet, got more cisapride, buprenorphine, got sub-q fluid under the skin. They did a blood test (see photo below) which shows slightly elevated (and some low) levels. Vet said this could be caused by dehydraton or early kidney disease. He got x-rays done which shows gi stasis. They say concern is of the kidneys on xray due to shape and size. But they dont know anything more. Said they need to find a specialist who knows xrays to get opinion on the kidney.

I have tried to find as much info as I can about kidney disease in rabbits, and can hardly find anything about enlarged kidneys (aka hydronephrosis).

He is behaving more normal (less in pain, no teeth gritting, more attitude-y self in behaviour), wants to eat greens. Wants to drink when i syringe feed him water. Is taking syringe feeding well (sometimes spits it out a bit but generally going in well!). Ate a tiny bit of hay from my hand. But isn’t back to normal where he will go up to his bowls to eat himself aside from coming to you for greens of course! He is pooping good. He was just pooping on his blanket where he was laying but now he is back to jumping into litter box and pooping there as normal. Good amount of pee too. Looks normal and no sludge or anything. We are continuing with the feedings. I am doing sub-q fluids now twice a day for 3 days as vet said (i do that at home myself, he gets super stressed at the vet so dont want to stress him more because then he shakes and wont eat).

Any help would be greatly appreciated! I dont know could be the underlying condition here. He seems pretty happy, not 100% normal but a big improvement since day 1.

And as mentioned, last time it was at least 7 days till he was back to 100% with the last GI episode. His normal diet is good though – eats his hay, eats a little pellets, loves greens and loves water. So I’m not sure what could have caused this current GI episode at all!!

Oh yes and we gave urine sample today and are getting results back tomorrow!

 

[LBJ10]

Does he have a history of EC? When you think of kidney issues in rabbits, you tend to think EC first. There are treatments for kidney disease. @Azerane has some recent experience with this.

[bunnygal]

He has never had EC. No other symptoms like head tilt, leg paralysis, etc.

It’s blood test to check correct? For the titer right? But i heard if its negative, its negative but if its positive it doesnt necessarily mean positive?

I would only worry can the treatment fenbendazole cause issues like with bone marrow in case he doesnt have EC?

[bunnygal]

Also didnt mention but now that I think of it maybe i should…

 

lately Harchie is acting very horny. Yep… a neutered male rabbit! When we wanted to bond him to our other male (also neutered) named Max years ago, he would hump him and Max was terrified. We wrote it off as a dominance thing and decided better they not be friends! LoL.

Well off and on i would come into his room (he’s free range in my bedroom) and hear him making a sort of honking, humming type noise as he ran to greet me. Sometimes he would circle me. But he would never try to hump me. Well the last week or 2 he has been trying to mount my arm, leg etc. He starts smelling my arm or hand and goes nuts. His private part comes out and I give him his friend (stuffed animal), and he humps that. He also tries to bite/pull at my arm air. I had an elderly bunny who had a chronic illness that took up an enormous amount of time so unfortunately I didnt spend huge amounts of time with Harchie. I would play a little with him but my time was spent taking care of her with the constant feedings, medications, treatments, etc. Since she passed after Christmas, I have been spending more time with Harchie. I don’t know if that means anything, if the extra affection I have been showing him has made him more “happy”?

So now I’m wondering does this have anything to do with kidney, adrenals or anything? I mentioned it to the vet but she didn’t really discuss anything about it.

[Azerane]

Hormonal behaviour changes can be related to illness, but not necessarily. If you’re in the northern hemisphere spring can bring on hormonal behaviours as well, even in neutered rabbits. So that could possibly play a part.

In relation to the kidneys I’m afraid I can’t help with the x-ray. My Luna has severely damaged kidneys from E.c but on x-ray they looked normal, we only checked them on ultrasound as a precaution and found the poor condition they were in. Yes the test for E.c is a blood titre test, I believe the standard is to do two tests about two weeks apart so that you can compare the levels if they are present. Comparing the levels will show whether it’s an active infection or not.

Another easy test you can do at home is to check how much he drinks. This will vary between rabbits based on their weight of course, but my vet told me that my rabbit Luna should drink about 100ml of water per 24 hours for her weight (about 1.9kg at the time). I separated my rabbits for 24 hours and measured the amount of water I put into each of their water bowls. Luna drank roughly 150ml in the 24 hours, and my other rabbit Apollo who weighs much more at around 3.3kg only drank 125ml. Since you have two rabbits you can also measure out water for both of them and compare the amounts relative to their body weight. A rabbit with kidney problems will often drink excess water.

When Luna was diagnosed with E.c she didn’t have the main typical symptoms that you first think of for E.c (head tilt, spinning). The first symptom I noticed was a cataract in her left eye, when I had that checked out I noticed she’d lost weight and from there noticed the excessive drinking. She was eating normally, pooping normally etc. Unfortunately I think her infection was active for quite some time before I picked up on it, hence why she has such extensive kidney damage.

Her E.c was just over a year ago now, ever since she has been on once daily Semintra (Telmisartan) to assist her kidney function. She has never regained the lost weight, even though I feed her pellets and rolled oats soaked in water three times a day. I avoid calcuim and protein rich foods as these are tough on the kidneys too.

Something to keep in mind, if your bun is showing signs of problems with the kidneys then you need to avoid metacam for pain relief. It is very tough on the kidneys. My vet prescribed Gabapentin for Luna when she needed pain relief.

[LBJ10]

Yes, the test for EC is a titer. You can get false negatives. We have seen urinary symptom-only EC bunnies on the forum, so that is why I brought it up.

Thank you Azerane, I couldn’t remember what medication Luna was on for her kidneys. There are definitely treatment options for kidney disease, so I wanted to make sure bunnygal was aware.

 

As for the hormonal behaviors… it may or may not be related. An enlarged kidney could, in theory, affect the adrenal gland. Plus urinary tract problems overall can cause humping. But as Azarane pointed out, sometimes bunnies just get frisky in the spring. The changes in light and temperature can trigger hormones, even in neutered rabbits.

[bunnygal]

Thanks for your help!!

We got back the urine test and its basically negative. There was a tiny bit of bacteria but so tiny that they said its probably contamination from collecting.

We did another blood test today to retest to see if the slight increase was due to dehydration or kidney disease. Should have results tomorrow!

Also we did a blood test for EC so hopefully will have an answer on that too! That one takes a few days.

Other doc did a thorough exam and said kidneys are not necessarily enlarged on x-ray because they would be 2 vertibrae in size or bigger and they are about 1.5.

She also did a physical and said he didnt show any pain or anything when pressing on the kidneys and she didnt feel them swollen either.

 

Hopefully we will have more answers soon. And pray he will be feeling better and eating his hay and pellets on his own (not just greens!)

We lost a bunny in December after Christmas (she was over 11 years old and had chronic illness), and another bunny suddenly 3 weeks ago who went into gi stasis and died suddenly a few days later. His blood work came back the day after he passed and it showed complete failure of kidney, liver etc. The numbers were through the roof above the normal range, showing organ shutdown. Luckily he didnt suffer for long and passed quickly in my arms at home but I am not terrified to lose another bunny. Harchie is over 9 years old and we also have a rex named Max who is also around 9-10 (also adopted so dont know complete age).  I have been traumatized by all these deaths and emotionally so hurt. We went through a nice long period of having all 4 bunnies and no health issues, but they all got older and you know how it goes… So we are left with the 2 ones close to 10 years old and I dont want to think about them passing even though I know it will happen one day. It’s so hard being a bunny parent some times… you love them so much and they bring happiness, but it is absolutely devastating when they pass. It’s like I lost a part of myself.

 

Thanks for listening.

[LBJ10]

It’s hard when they get old, especially when you have multiple bunnies that are around the same age. I’m sure the organ failure in your one bunny has nothing to do with the current situation. When their body starts to shut down due to old age and underlying health conditions, that is just what happens. The organs start to fail and that is what ultimately causes them to pass.

It’s good that the other vet didn’t think the kidney situation was overly alarming. I’m sure you will have a better plan of action once all of the other tests come back.

[bunnygal]

Yes results came back on his new blood test and the kidney function is back to normal!!

We are just waiting for EC tests back because she still thinks he may have that which could cause the Gi stasis and will need to go on Fenbendazole. We will see what the blood work says.

 

I am still puzzled on his hormones. He was going nuts today! I will have to think what is the next thing we can think about testing that. I dont want to put him through more now at the same time though because after the last week of so many vet visits, he needs a break. The last vet visit he came home so stressed out and shaking and stress can put them into gi stasis so dont want to add any fuel to the fire!

[DanaNM]

Glad to hear his kidneys are good!

I also have a 13 yr old senior (Bun Jovi) that can get super hormonal (honking, spraying, trying to mount his bonded mate), etc. After doing a full work up on his bladder to rule out those issues, I did some experimenting with his diet and found that when he eats a lot of calcium or gets dehydrated he turns into a honking mounting fiend. So I cut out almost all kale, dandelion, and parsley from his diet, and it made a huge difference. Not sure what your bun’s diet is but if he gets a lot of parsley or dandelion especially, that could be contributing!

That and any stressful event can contribute, so he could just be having a flair-up due to all the vet visits etc. Bun Jovi was CRAZY with the honking after we moved due to the combo of a new place, and I think he got dehydrated during the trip.

I did also consider that he could have an adrenal issue, but there isn’t really any treatment for that in rabbits to my knowledge, and adjusting his diet really has helped.

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[LBJ10]

Glad to hear his kidneys are OK! Yeah, it’s hard to say what is causing the hormonal behavior. I did have a stress humper, so perhaps stress is playing into this as well?

[bunnygal]

I noticed the humping started before this GI episode.

He doesnt eat any parsley or dandelion. Just lettuce, dill and cilantro.

I read about some rabbit treatments on a different website, but I wouldn’t want to put him on anything without knowing first as everything has side effects. Not sure if this vet will have any ideas on what to do next. We are still waiting on EC blood test result, so one thing at a time!

It’s strange because he used to be extremely grumpy, that was just his normal behaviour to lunge at you and grunt. And he hasnt lunged at me in like a week or two… which is beyond not normal for him! Can you be upset your bunny isnt mean to you?! haha. It’s just such a drastic change! It’s all so puzzling!! As long as there isn’t any health repercussions, then I can deal with the behaviour. I just want to make sure he will live a long life still!

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