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rat health update
Apr. 5th, 2006 08:41 pmThe antibiotics didn't help with the strange breathing sounds and hiccups my rat Dustin makes, so I took him to the vet again this afternoon. This time the vet took an x-ray of Dustin's heart and lungs (under anesthesia, thankfully it was with gas so it wore off quickly), and besides the heart not being in quite the right position, there's also something wrong with his lung. There's an area that doesn't look like it should, presumably either water in his lung, or it could be an abscess. He also said it could be a collapsed area if Dustin had injured himself, but his ribs were all okay, and I never noticed any accidents or Dustin acting as if in pain (I mean I would have brought him to the vet then!), so that's less likely. That side apparently also sounds different when he listened to Dustin's breathing, but Dustin didn't like to hold still, so the vet had a hard time hearing anything definite over his movements and struggling.
Anyway, the vet gave him an injection of some med to help drain the water from the lung, which if it works should cause the sounds to improve tonight, and I am to watch him closely, to be able to tell whether this course of treatment works. I also got some to give him twice tomorrow (luckily I can give it to him orally) and then I have to bring Dustin to see the vet again Friday morning. I hope I at least recognize this, because he doesn't make these sounds constantly, only sometimes, and also the sounds are rather quiet, i.e. I either have to be very close or there has to be no background noise of any kind for me to hear it at all, so it's a hard to judge whether it's really getting better.
This sucks. Dustin's only eight months, it's unfair that he has to deal such problems, and this is far more serious than I expected. I'm really worried about him.
On the rather shallow side it also seems like I won't be buying the Firefly DVDs I wanted to get, because obviously the vet costs that are piling up have priority.
Anyway, the vet gave him an injection of some med to help drain the water from the lung, which if it works should cause the sounds to improve tonight, and I am to watch him closely, to be able to tell whether this course of treatment works. I also got some to give him twice tomorrow (luckily I can give it to him orally) and then I have to bring Dustin to see the vet again Friday morning. I hope I at least recognize this, because he doesn't make these sounds constantly, only sometimes, and also the sounds are rather quiet, i.e. I either have to be very close or there has to be no background noise of any kind for me to hear it at all, so it's a hard to judge whether it's really getting better.
This sucks. Dustin's only eight months, it's unfair that he has to deal such problems, and this is far more serious than I expected. I'm really worried about him.
On the rather shallow side it also seems like I won't be buying the Firefly DVDs I wanted to get, because obviously the vet costs that are piling up have priority.