Rabbit seizures

[Alex]

Hello I came on her to seek some help.
I have a two year old female holland lop. Recently she has been suffering from seizures and they have been happening quite a bit. I took her to the vet yesterday and they said she seemed in perfect health and to give her pain meds and critical care. After the vet she seemed to get much worse. Not accepting the critical care or water not eating on her own at all.

I took her to the vet today because it was clear to me she was having seizures. The vet witnessed three seizures within the hour I dropped her off. They did IV fluids and tried to help her.

They want to charge me thousands of dollars to get a bunch of tests done. While I would love to do that I financially can’t. I’m a college student and I would literally do anything for my bun. But the vet even told me that even if we get all these tests done I’d have to wait a few days until the lab specialists get all the equipment and then it would take a day or two to get the results.

im not sure what to do I talked to another vet that recommended I put her down. She seems in so much pain and I have done everything I can do to my extent to help her.

Any advice? Shes refusing to eat on her own. She’s crashing into things as if she were blind. I’ve had to restrict her to her small cage so she can stop hurting herself. She’s behind grinding her teeth and it’s been making a squeaky sound. The vets said her front and molars are good though.

I was given antibiotics and pain medication today and hoping to see some improvements

[DanaNM]

I’m so sorry you are dealing with this. What a horrible situation. 🙁

I do not know very much about rabbit seizures, but this info on medirabbit might be helpful:

http://www.medirabbit.com/EN/Neurology/seizure.htm

It says that rabbits can be left blind from seizures in some cases.

I am bit surprised to see the vet gave antibiotics, did they have a reason to? Is the vet an exotics specialist?

Did the vet have a suspected cause? My thoughts immediately went to a toxin (the flea medication Frontline, for example, is toxic to bunnies), but there could be other causes (see the link above). I think I would have a frank conversation with the vet about what the most likely cause they think it could be, and what would be done to treat if various causes were discovered.

In the mean time try to pad her area and keep everything as dark and calm as possible.

. . . 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.  

[Alex]

Thank you for your response.

They are an exotics specialist and today I had her with the vet that works with a lot more rabbits than the vet we had yesterday.

The lady told me they suspect an ear infection? And without doing all those lab tests they have no way of confirming so they wanted me to try these antibiotics.

Personally I feel awful cause I can’t afford all those exams. So I’m at a loss here

[Bam]

I agree with all that Dana has written.

A middle ear infection can cause seizures. The balance organs are located within the ear. E cuniculi, which is cause by a microscopic parasite that the bun can have been born with, can also cause seizures.

For an ear infection, antibiotics is what you do. For e cuniculi, you give an anti parasitic med called fenbendazole. It is often combined with the antibiotic Baytril. To bring down inflammation and to relieve pain,you often get Metacam (meloxicam).

You can have testing done for e cuniculi, but the tests are not always reliable. A full blood test (CBC) can give important clues about the immune defence and organ status. If this is too pricey for your current budget, many vets will try to treat empirically with antibiotics and pain meds.

Teeth grinding is a sign of pain in rabbits, if it occurs with other symptoms of pain/discomfort. Rabbits are very sensitive to pain, and pain meds are often vital for survival. Crashing into things might not be about inability to see, it could be about her balance being completely off. This is consistent with both an ear infection and e cuniculi.

It is very important that you get some food into her. It’s not known if rabbits can be nauseous (they cant vomit), but some vets will prescribe a motion-sickness antihistamine in case the apparent vertigo is causing nausea like it would in a human. This could help with appetite.

Please keep us updated.

 

[jerseygirl]

It sounds like she needs a stronger pain med or higher dose. What dose did they prescribe for her?

I wonder if some anti-seizure medication could help her settle also.

If this is too pricey for your current budget, many vets will try to treat empirically with antibiotics and pain meds.

I wanted to echo this point that Bam made. This is so often the approach my vets take and why I continue to return to them. It comes from their having years of experience and their knowing me. They know I pay my vet bills but they also know I have to watch my funds and I’ll want to go straight to trying to treating symptoms to see if it helps before going to do a bunch of tests. I think when you walk in to a new place, they offer all the options. I experienced that one time with a dog.

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