Sudden Bunny illness

[Emma]

Hi

New here. Looking for some input. I adopted a 14 week old Netherland Dwarf bunny last Wednesday. Picked her up and was told she was in perfect health. Brought her home as she’s a in door bunny and lives in my room away from my dogs etc, let her settle in and she was eating, drinking, pooping and playing fine with and rest of the family members, wasn’t nervous at all. Today, Sunday morning, went to feed her and found her laid out, lethargic and lots of diarrhoea

Having previous experience with rabbits, I know Diarrhoea isn’t a good thing so rushed her to the out of hours at my vets, they checked her over and said she was very dehydrated and kept her in and put her on IV for fluids and antibiotics also. I called mid day to see how she was and said she had another bad bought of the runs. Called again at 6:30PM and said its slowly slowing down but she isn’t eating still. 

She has Timothy hay at all times, 20-30 grams of excel rabbit pellets and been trying to introduce greens to her diet which she won’t entertain at the minute. But since she’s away from other animals and my hands are always clean before handling her, vet suspects right now she’s picked something up while at the shelter. She was booked in for her vaccinations on Monday too! Which has been put back until she’s better. 

I called the shelter and they said they would pay the vet bill. Why are they paying? Something that didn’t tell me maybe?

Been upset all day worried she was going to die and felt like “what if I did something wrong?”

[LittlePuffyTail]

I’m so sorry to hear this. I’m hoping there will be some positive update when you read this.

With her being young and from a shelter, my guess is that she has coccidia. This is a parasitic infection that is highly contagious.

Did your vet do a fecal test to determine if this is the cause?

[Emma]

Even though she was in a shelter, each rabbit was separated off by glass anyway.

Unfortunately she still not eating by herself and now she is barely accepting critical care off the vet and now I don’t know what to do since she’s barely accepting anything ? the Diarrhea has slowed down since this morning but they worried about her not eating and slowly accepting less and and less critical care.

[Bunny House]

They should do a blood test, fecal test and maybe even an X-ray. Sub q fluids need to be gaven and painmeds too. An antibiotic -metanitrozol for the diarrhea. They will also need to force feed her. This is a rabbit savvy vet right?

[LBJ10]

I would be suspicious that it is coccidia as well. It’s most common in young bunnies and it extremely contagious. She wouldn’t need direct contact with other rabbits to get it. I believe incubation is up to 7 days, I can’t remember for sure. So the vet is correct in saying that it probably came from the shelter. Someone could have cleaned the enclosure of a sick rabbit and then handled her at the shelter.

All you can do for coccidia is supportive care and antibiotics. Is she currently at the vet or under your care at home?

[Emma]

She’s with the vet and been on medication last 2 nights.

But got a call this morning to say she’s up and about and finally eating on her own. Just waiting for her to poop now and when she does, can come home.

[LBJ10]

That’s great! Sometimes it’s better for them to stay at the vet so things can be adjusted as needed. It sounds like whatever the vet is doing is working.

[Author]

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