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Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please #131485
08/12/06 02:09 AM
08/12/06 02:09 AM

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I have a 2 month OOP joey currently trying to recover from HLP, low blood sugar and severe dehydration. A little history to inform you. We had 4 gliders. 2 males, 2 females. Both males fought incesantly as did both females so we divided them into pairs, all was harmonious. We were feeding BML diet. Each pair produced one joey each, wonderfully healthy. This January we obtained 2 additional gliders both males, bonded brothers. We kept them on the diet they were on and changed our gliders over to their diet. It was a well known diet, the gliders seemed to prefer the new diet, so we kept it. In March we moved and purchased a house. The 2 male brothers passed away suddenly and sadly, we figured it was the stress of the move. They were 6 months old. We discovered that our females were yet again expecting joeys. One female had a single female joey and the other had twin girl joeys. While nursing they were all the wonderful healthy happy joeys we wanted. At between 6-7 weeks old they started emerging from the sleeping pouch to explore and eat the diet with the adults. The single female joey seemed to have a slight limp on one of her back legs. 2 weeks earlier we had to pull her father out of the cage as he had begun attacking all the females visciously, we thought maybe he had hurt her. Took her to vet nothing found wrong. No blood work up was done as she was eating, drinking and playing happily. The only tail tail sign at that time was her tail was not as groomed as it could have been. Brought her home and sadly a week later she was dead. The twin girls we still with us. One emerged from the sleeping pouch and would exlore and the other would peek out from the pouch and crab at anything that moved. MAybe she just wasn't ready to explore yet. We noticed that her tail began to have the signs of not being as groomed as it should, but she had wonderful parents who we would watch bring food to the pouch for the joeys to eat, very attentive parents. The twins reach 8 weeks and Daddy still baby sits them in the pouch while Mommy goes and eats first. Wake up and go to retrieve dishes and found one of the twins on the bottom of the cage in seisures. Cold to the touch and matted fur. Scoop her up she was severely dehydrated so began with 0.1ML pedialyte every 5 min, call hubby home from work(he works over an hour away). Keep her warm and offer liquids. The siesures began to ease. Having longer periods between episodes. Hubby gets home and we rush her to the vet, we have an emergency vet who does treat gliders. Thankfully she had just joined our emergency vet hospital as the only vet who does see gliders doesn't have an emergency service. She was diagnoses with HLP, low blood sugar and severe dehydration. Calcium injection was given and the vet gave us 4 more doses to administer at home. She was given a high percentage of NOT surviving the night. Stay up with her all night still giving pedialyte every 20-30 min as she was given sub-q fluids at the vet as well. She was up to 0.2ML of pedialyte. She survived the night. She started taking more pedialyte and was up to 0.5ML every 30 min, kept her warm with a hot water bottle in her hospital bed. I tried food later that day and she refused but would still readily drink the pedialyte. Up to 0.7ML now every 40 min. Offer some food mixed with the pedialyte she began to drink it. Offered the food/pedialyte mixture every 40 min and gradually increased the amount of food mixed with pedialyte. By the early evening she was eating food melted to room temperature and given by syringe. I sat up with her on my chest giving her warmth and comfort as best I could. Finally she urinated that evening a rather large large puddle on my shirt which I was happy to allow. She had a small bowel movement that was hard, tiny and black. Her second evening home administer calcium shot and offer syringe of food and syringe of pedialyte every hour. Sat up with her all night allowing her to sleep on my chest as I did the first night. Morning of the third day she had a very nice bowel movement soft, well formed and about 1/2 inch long, wonderful sight. Go out and get ingredients for Joey glider formula from Ruth's glider page with puppy formula to get more calcium in her. Figured she was as week as a newborn so she could use all the help she could get. She now tried to groom herself and will groom for short bursts of time as her energy is still low. Her fur is starting to have that nice clean look to it. We looked at the attempt to groom as an improvement. This is her 3rd day and she has great control over her tail today and keeps it fiercly curled around her when she sleeps, we took that as a sign of improvement as she had very little tail movement before. She still can't walk and has a hard time holding her head up. I offered her a small feeding dish of food and she was actually licking it up on her own. She couldn't hold her head up out of the formula so I supported her under her chest to allow her to eat yet keep her nose from smothering herself in her food. She eats about 1/2 teaspoon of formula in a sitting now about every 2 hours. I get little cat naps inbetween feedings. She had her third shot tonight but didn't seem to want to move out of her warm hospital bed which is a small tub with lid(holes drilled for vent). 2 inches of fleece on the bottom, one of my t-shirts to snuggle in and a hot water bottle on the side wrapped in fleece. She sleeping more comfortably now it seems as her breaths have lengthed and deepened, she had panting shallow at the begining. She seems to be keeping more of her body heat in tonight. This is still the 3rd night and she received her 3rd shot of calcium. She still won't chew anything as she seems to have problems chewing so she is on a liquid/semi-liquid diet. Tonight she doesn't seem to want to move and I have gone back to syringe feeding her and she sleeping alot today.

The vet said I should get something called Calcionate it is a liquid calcium. I have looked at walgreens(drugstore), pet stores and infant areas and can not find the liquid calcium. Pills, tablets and chews are everywhere but no liquid.

Is it too soon to get my hopes up that she will pull through? If she does pull through will she fully recover or be a special needs glider? The vet said her brain will need time to recover from the seisures. Is there anything else I can do for her at this time? Sadly we have also noticed that the other twin is starting to have a tail that is not as groomed as it should be and is spending more time back in the sleeping pouch. I don't know if this is diet related or stress from the move still. We have been moved in for almost 3 months now. Out of the 3 joeys born under this diet we've lost one and almost a second with the third showing signs the others did. We are changing our diet back to BML to see if that is the cause.

Another note. The only yogurt I could find that actually stated "live active cultures" was a soy based organic infant yogurt, Stonebrook or Stoneyfields one of those names. It did state on it "Helps in the absorption of calcium", but with all the controversy on Soy I don't know rather to feed it or not. At this time I am feeding it since I don't have any alternate yogurt.

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please [Re: ] #131486
08/12/06 03:07 AM
08/12/06 03:07 AM
Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 3,071
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i give yogurt everynight stoneyfield is the best. have you done a urine culture and sensitivity and direct fecal float with gram stain hlp can be bought on by a bacterial infection. usually it is secondary to a bacteria. i would have these tests run.

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please [Re: ] #131487
08/12/06 04:14 AM
08/12/06 04:14 AM

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Neither test has been done. I will ask the vet about them. The diet we previously used called for plain non-fat yogurt which they received nightly. But I will call the vet in the morning and see if these tests can be done.

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please [Re: ] #131488
08/12/06 07:56 AM
08/12/06 07:56 AM
Joined: Aug 2004
Posts: 14,788
Cleveland, Ohio
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Posts: 14,788
Cleveland, Ohio
[:"green"]It is good that you are switching back to the BML - I also switched to BML after my 12 year old glider, Pika, came down with HLP last winter...

As gliders_angel said, usually HLP is secondary to an infection - usually bacterial. I would have ALL of your gliders tested for HLP and have a culture & sensitivity test, plus fecal float run on all of them. Since the other joey is showing signs of not grooming her tail, based on everything else you've said, she probably also has HLP. Definitely get her checked out ASAP.
It sounds like you are doing everything correctly for her at this time & although you have a long road ahead of you, it is encouraging that she has made it through 3 days since the seizures. It is possible that she will never fully recuperate from this & will always be a special needs glider. When she gets to the point that you can put her back into the cage, I would recommend putting a full-size hammock in the cage about half-way up. That way, if she falls due to the weakness in her hind legs, she will have a soft landing. Hammocks are easy to make... just follow the directions for making a No Sew Shelf Hammock.
For further information about dealing with gliders that have HLP, read the thread about Caring for Gliders with HLP.
Please keep us updated... I'll be praying for you & your little ones.
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Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please [Re: ] #131489
08/12/06 11:13 AM
08/12/06 11:13 AM
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 22,749
80 acres of paradise in KS
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Because of the deaths of the other gliders and joey, I too strongly recommend the tests be done. HLP to come on suddenly in a joey sends up a red flag to me that it is secondary to parasite or bacterial problem. These two things can not only prevent absorbtion of calcium but can leach it from the bones as well. The bacterial problems can be cause from stress (like from the move). It this is the issue, until you adress the primary problem, recovery will either not happen or only be temporary.

You might also want to discuss with your vet giving some stuff called Benebac. It can be found at most pet stores. It helps replace the beneficial bacteria in the digestive system (much like the yogurt will).


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Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please [Re: ] #131490
08/12/06 03:24 PM
08/12/06 03:24 PM

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You may also want to contact CharlieH or Xfilefan - as they have both dealth with HLP extensively and I know they would be more than willing to walk you through this.

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please [Re: ] #131491
08/15/06 07:06 AM
08/15/06 07:06 AM

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Talked with the vet and asked about antibiotics. She said they usually do give antibiotics with the calcium treatment but she didn't want to give the antibiotics all at once, I don't think any of us really expected Spice to pull through. The vet didn't want to have me pay for the antibiotics with such a high chance of Spice not surviving, but now that she is through the darkest part she went ahead and gave some antibiotics, gave me enough to treat all the gliders with it. Spice has been on the antibiotics for 3 days and her sister Sugar has been on them for 2 days. Spice is grooming herself alot more, but still moving slowly. She has a hard time keeping her body heat up so we still keep the hot water bottle in with her and she either lays ontop of it all sprawled out enjoying the heat of she will curl up next to it.

We've uped the calcium in everyones diet and the all seem to have alot more energy. Not sure if that is the diet change or what, but coats are starting to look alot healthier and groomed to that cottony silky soft feel. Thick and full. Tails are bushier and it's only been a week. Is it normally like this when they improve?

Will keep you all updated as to how she is doing. Thank you.

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please [Re: ] #131492
08/15/06 10:39 AM
08/15/06 10:39 AM

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Be very careful with adding too much calcium. Too much can be just as bad as not enough. Too much can be harmful to their little livers. HLP is a slow recovery disease, their bodies can't repair overnight or over, say a week of treatment. My Itchy came to me with HLP in November 2005, we placed him on BML immediately and he has had a very very slow recovery. Just regular mixed BML, the vet I use is a very Glider knowledgeable vet and did not want to put too much stress on his liver. After several weeks Ichy started walking better and after several months, he started climbing more and more. I know he won't be 100%, ever, but he does get around quite well now. You've done soo much for Spice so far, just don't give up! I sure hope your little Spice pulls though, recovery hugs coming your way! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/hug2.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/hug2.gif" alt="" />

Please contact Xfilefan or Charlie H.

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? Help please [Re: ] #131493
08/15/06 03:48 PM
08/15/06 03:48 PM

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Aw, hang in there, sounds like you are doing everything you can. Your babies are so lucky to have you. Please continue to keep us updated.

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? *Update* [Re: ] #131494
08/21/06 07:25 AM
08/21/06 07:25 AM

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It's been almost 2 weeks and Spice is still with us. She had a small set back a few days ago but bounced back quickly.

Thanks Jen <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thanx.gif" alt="" />, the new diet..well is a miracle diet. I can't hold her in her regular pouch anymore. Last night was sitting in my chair holding her and she came crawling out of her pouch and climbed all over me then actually GLIDDED to the bed, granted the bed is only 1 foot away but still. She glidded to the bed and started running around on the bed. She didn't want to be scooped up. She thought it was a game of keep away and did her best to not let us catch her. She's been running around her hospital bed. She seems to be keeping her own body heat up.

Would it be advisable to put her in a small cage? Or just keep her in her hospital bed for a little longer? She is back to her crabby self, crabs at everything. Touch her hospital bed..she crabs, lift the lids..crab, touch her food dish..crab, touch her pouch..crab, touch her..crab. It's wonderful sounds, she was so quiet and didn't crab for the last 2 weeks.

We are just so happy she is still with us <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cloud9.gif" alt="" />.

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? *Update* [Re: ] #131495
08/21/06 07:33 AM
08/21/06 07:33 AM

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I am so glad she made it through. Thought and prayers to you and your babies. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/heartpump.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/heartpump.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/heartpump.gif" alt="" />

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? *Update* [Re: ] #131496
08/21/06 11:44 AM
08/21/06 11:44 AM
Joined: Mar 2006
Posts: 21,060
Kansas
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Wow! I am so happy that she is finally making great strides in recovery! Your doing a wonderful job and she knows it the little pill pot, I think her crabbing is showing you how "spoiled" she really is! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/roflmao.gif" alt="" />

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? *Update* [Re: ] #131497
08/22/06 09:48 AM
08/22/06 09:48 AM

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Aw, thanks so much for the update, so glad to hear she's back to crabbing. Funny how we so miss that noise when something is wrong, huh. Keep hanging in there, you've been an incredible suggie parent <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Re: Hind leg paralysis recovery? *Update* [Re: ] #131498
09/03/06 02:57 AM
09/03/06 02:57 AM

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Wonderful news, I am so happy for you and your baby!
Angie


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