Clear fluid from genital area

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Manda

Active member
Joined
Mar 31, 2010
Messages
27
My chinchilla suddenly has clear fluid coming from her genital area. It is not odorous, or thick. It is not pee. It looks just like water. Her belly and bum are now wet from it. She seems to be examining her bits down there every so often but did not appear to be in distress. She was eating shortly after I first noticed it and now a bit more came out and she appears restless. It is 3 am where I am and a vet visit isn't possible at this time. Her movement is becoming irregular at times but she's continuing to eat hay and drink water. I'm very concerned and don't know what this is or if there is anything I can do until I'm able to take her to a vet.
 
Confine her to a small carrier so you can measure her drinking, eating and poops. A vet visit asap is very important. Have you weighed her to check for any changes? Is she caged alone?
 
I have been weighing her regularly, her weight had been rapidly increasing for the past two months. It has decreased a little since the highest point but has remained at around 735 for this week about 15 grams less than her heaviest weight. She is caged alone. Her poops have been a bit smaller than usual but have been frequent.

I have called the vet. The earliest the exotic vet can see her is 2:30 this afternoon as he has surgeries in the morning. They said I could bring her in this morning if I like and they can keep her there for the day but I am keeping her at home to avoid any added stress. If she appears to get any worse before then they said I can rush her there.

She is eating and drinking and acts normal otherwise. It still appears to be leaking every so often and when it does she appears uncomfortable and is constantly cleaning down there. At the moment she is sleeping. I hope she'll be okay until the vet can see her.
 
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Update: She has open Pyometra. She has surgery booked Monday morning to have her uterus removed. They told me closed Pyometra is more serious and if she had that they would have her in for surgery tomorrow morning. They are already booked for many surgeries in the morning and since its open Pyometra the vet told me she should be okay until then. If she gets worse I'm told to call them and they will do emergency surgery. At the moment she is acting normal, eating, and chewing on her lava stones. The vet says he's done many surgeries with chinchillas and has a high success rate.

However I've read that chinchilla's can have problems recovering from a spay. Is there anything else I should know so I can be better prepared? Are there any signs I should look for between now and Monday to let me know if it is getting worse other than obvious signs of distress? I want her to have her best chance of surviving.
 
My question for them would be if they are available over the weekend. If she crashes and burns on sat or sun.... many vets are not open 24/7. Watch for her to stop eating, reluctance to move, or if the discharge stops. Those are signs of an emergency. Did he give her any meds in the mean time? After surgery she may be reluctant to eat. Be sure to have critical care or life line on hand. They should send her home with antibiotics and pain meds. Use probiotics as well to.repopulate her bowel for at least a week after meds end.
 
The vet wants to wait to give meds after the surgery so he didn't send me home with any for her. I will call them if I see any of those signs for sure. The vet clinic is open Saturday but not Sunday. I have lifeline and Intensive care whole food formula.
 
Urgh pyometra. Had two chins go through this and an emergency spay.

I copied the below from a response I made a thread about pyometra some time ago:

"Extra probiotics would probably help too....you can get acidophilus capsules from any pharmacy. Just break one open and add it to the watery critical care mix.
While you're at the pharmacy, get several 15ml wide bore syringes as well, for feeding the cc mix. Eyedroppers also work, but syringes will allow you to more accurately monitor how much she is taking.

Use the search function on the forum to find tips on how to "burrito" her....it's a way of safely holding her still if she tries to fight you when you're giving her food. If she wont eat out of the syringe herself, then you will need to force feed her: this is when burritoing is invaluable.
She'll need around 100mls of cc mix a day....break up the feedings into 4-6 servings. If she'll take more, then feel free to give her more. Slow and steady wins here.

She'll probably be on Metacam for the pain, plus some prophylactic antibiotics, and you may need to burrito her to administer these as well.

Take all the shelves and furniture out of her cage: you don't want her trying to jump anywhere for at least 2-3 weeks. If she is usually on woodchips, then you'll need to change her onto fleece, as woodchips can irritate the wound. Change the fleece 2 times a day minimum. Keeping her bed clean is very important.

Watch her very very carefully for any biting at the wound. If she does this, she'll unfortunately need a cone, in which case she'll be even more dependent on you for food and water intake. You may need to hand feed single strands of hay, if she gets a cone.

When 2 of my girls went through emergency spays (due to pyometra), I put a microwaveable heat pad in their cage. I warmed it just to a gentle heat, and they loved putting their sore tummies on it. If you do this, just make sure the pad is not too hot, and that your chin is capable of moving well away from the heat pad if she wants to.

It's gonna be a tough time for both of you, but you CAN get through it.
Oh and I nearly forgot to say, no dust baths for 3 weeks either. Good luck. "

I hope this helps. Best wishes to you and your chin *hugs*
 
Thank you. That is going to be so helpful!

She is home from the surgery today, all went well. She is eating a little bit here and there but not much today. I was prescribed three different things for her.

Metacam - 0.14 ml every 24 hours for four days.

Baytril - 0.5 tablets twice a day

Florentero - 0.25 ml twice a day for 10 days.

I live in Alberta, Canada. The cost for the examination, diagnostics testing, hospital supplies, operation, metacam injection, and medications was about $487.00. I thought I would share if it helps anyone who also encounters pyometra in a chinchilla.

Tilly is not happy with me at all and I haven't even given her any meds yet. She will run when I open the door and won't even look at me. Poor girl. She's just sitting in the corner facing the wall.
 
She'll come around in time. Like very small children, they don't understand that as bad as they feel you did what was in their best interest. :)
 
Quick update:

The first 3 days after the surgery were extremely frightening. Tilly hardly ate any food. Force feeding went over poorly and I had a lot of trouble doing so by myself. I had to have someone come over and help me. She went to the vet the day after surgery so they could feed her and monitor her all day because I was scared. She did not poop the first two days. All medicine also had to be forced. I found she would eat a little on her own only if I would sit there and give her individual hay strands while talking to her. Tilly was also very lethargic and I had to move her to wake her up and feed her. Water had to be placed in front of her face so she would drink. I would reheat her heating pad every few hours through the first three nights because her ears felt ice cold otherwise.

Yesterday she finally began eating pellets and more hay and this morning she's been eating like normal. She is also now being supplemented with critical care, which she's in love with (the vet had to order it for me and it just came in yesterday). She's much more alert and taking medicines easily now. I can mix her florentero (probiotics) into critical care and she will eat it just like that where as before it was always a struggle. Poops are not quite normal size yet but are frequent. She's quickly forgiven me and even slept in my lap for over an hour two days ago, something she's never done before. She's amazing and I'm so happy she's getting back to normal.

We are on day six. Metacam is now all finished up. She has antibiotics and probiotics for another 5 days and then she will be done all medication. :) Hopefully things continue to go in this direction.
 
That's so wonderful. I'm sorry you and Tilly had to go through this, but so relieved that she seems to be recovering.
 
Tilly unfortunately has passed away...

She started to became lethargic every couple of days. She would lay in her litter bowl all day and would hardly eat or drink. Her movement was extremely odd as if she was uncomfortable. She would really push her pelvis forward and drag her belly. I took her to the vet the first time it happened. When we got there she acted completely normal and he couldn't find anything wrong with her. She wasn't bloated. The next day she was back to normal and eating regularly. The second time she became lethargic was a few days later, with the same symptoms again. This time I decided to wait thinking maybe she has some painful days and needed to rest. For next couple of days after that she was normal again. She had her best day since the surgery ever, poos normal sized, bright, eating and drinking lots. The very next day she became lethargic a third time and once again I decided to wait thinking she'd be okay again. This was my mistake. The next morning after that I noticed she had diarrhea. I took her to the vet that morning because I know how serious that can be. By the time her appointment came she was extremely weak. The vet said she had diarrhea but she was also constipated and she had lots of poo causing a blockage and she was bloated. They kept her there while I was at work. A few hours later I got the call that she had passed away due to toxicity. There wasn't enough time to flush it out. I don''t know if this was even related to her having the surgery previously as she was healing extremely well. I don't know why this happened.

I've only had her for three months but I miss her like I've known her forever. She had a crappy life before I had her and I wanted her to have a good long life but it just wasn't meant to be. I'm just devastated. I've lost both my chinchilla's in a span of 4 months...I can't handle the sadness anymore...My poor babies.
 
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