Enterococcus Species?

[threewingedfury]

So, after waiting a week for labs to come back on my chin with mastitis, the vet called this morning to tell me it could be another 2 weeks before we get a definite answer of what to do. Andariel's labs show a resistant strain of enterococcus species which require further testing. At this time, no antibiotic has been found to clear this up from the testing. From what I've seen, enterococcus faecium is a probiotic in animal food, but other than that - I'm not really familiar with it.

Anyone ever had any problems with this bacteria?

 

[Stackie]

I know that enterococci have been known to cause mastitis in dairy cows. It is present in the bowels (hence being a probiotic), but can cause infections elsewhere.

Here is a good article on drug resistant enterococci: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/vol4no2/huycke.htm

It's MicrobeWiki page: http://microbewiki.kenyon.edu/index.php/Enterococcus

 

[threewingedfury]

Has vancomycin ever been used in chinchillas? I'm just wondering if this is what it's all going to boil down to since after 7 days of testing, there isn't an antibiotic we can use yet. I don't remember reading anything about it in chins. I'm hoping this isn't a VRE, because then I really won't know what to do. I worry about the fact that it can be toxic, as my husband was on it for over a year and a half due to bouts of MRSA.

 

[threewingedfury]

Just to update those that are following, Andariel's final labs came back last Tuesday that show a resistant enterrococcus that was only sensitive to penicillin. There is also a minor staphylococcus infection that was resistant to everything but penicillin. I asked the vet to put her on chloramphenical, which she protested as she wanted to perform a mastectomy, but I convinced her to do so because the mass seems to be reabsorbing somewhat, as her skin is no longer stretched tight and is now beginning to hang.

So after a week of waiting for the chloramphenical to come in from TX, I finally got it compounded yesterday afternoon and attempted to give her 1 mL of it. Complete failure. The pharmacy had added a strawberry flavor to it to help with the taste, but it didn't work. She honestly looked like she was choking because it had such a horrible taste. So, the pharmacy added in Bitter-Stop and a banana flavor to see if that would help. The pharmacist actually tasted of the mixture and told me that he didn't think it would help because it was so bitter (which I'm surprised he did so, considering chloramphenical can cause aplastic anemia). So, I'm mixing 1mL in her critical care and it's taking me about an hour and a half to feed 15-20 mL of the CC mixed with it. She absolutely hates the taste. The pharmacy doesn't have the proper ventilation system and hood to create an injectible mixture and the closest compounding facility that can do it is 3 hours away, so I'm gonna be spending 3 hrs feeding antibiotics each day.

 

[lilchinchilla]

That is weird. My chins take chloramphenicol easily but then again we have it as a minty flavor here. I hope things work out. I find it is one of the best broad spectrum antibiotics to use on chinchillas.

 

[jags]

Have you tried soaking a warm tea bag on the area? Alice Kline told me about doing this and it has worked the few times I needed it.

 

[threewingedfury]

Yes, I did that in the beginning for over 2 weeks. Warm compresses, tea bags, lancings, etc. It's been a month and a half now and there are still 3 large lumps, though they are slowly going down in size, we're trying to cut out the infection. It popped up right after I took her kits from her. They were 9 weeks at the time, and hadn't been nursing much in weeks. After I noticed it, I put the babies back in, but the babies wouldn't nurse which didn't help very much at all.

 

[mercynursie]

Tiff I don't know why I didn't think about this sooner,it might help and I don't believe it can hurt her. You know I do ob-gyn nsg and one of the things we use/recommend is cabbage leaves for engorgement and even use them for mastitis.There is a natural chemical in the cabbage that reduces inflammation and dries up milk production. I realize that cabbage leaf compresses are probably unrealistic for your chin, but there is a cream available Cabbocream ?sp that might be helpful. I know its pretty expensive cause we weren't allowed to give it to our pts without lactation consult recommendation,but it just may help some with the inflammation and if it is prescription, any drugstore should be able to get it in for you.Just a thought.:hmm:

 

[threewingedfury]

Well that's neat. I'm not sure that it's really a problem with drying up milk now, as the kits have been weaned for over a month and a half, it's more of an infection issue. I'd never heard of using cabbage, but that's something to remember for the future if this happens again, which I really hope it doesn't.

 

[threewingedfury]

So - Andariel has been on the chloramphenical for a month. The mastitis is almost gone (has gotten down to pea-sized from the size of a golf ball). She does now have a heart murmur - probably from endocarditis. She had gotten down to 550g when I started the chloramphenical from 1100g back in August and she's up to 640g now, so I really have hope for her. She's beginning to eat like a pig, I'm filling her feeder twice a day. Now I just have to figure out how to treat the murmur, as there are no vets around here that will do an ultrasound on a chinchilla. My vet contacted offices up to 200 miles away, and they were just not comfortable doing so as they have no experience. Most likely it will be left alone, but my vet suggested her being on channel blockers the rest of her life, but I'm not too fond of that and I've talked with a few who have chins with murmurs who do fine in everyday life.

 

[Olallie]

Interesting thread. What could a heart murmur do to a chinchilla?