Hi, I need advice please....

When I went in to check on my gliders this morning, my sweet little
boy, Alfie was in his pouch making strange crabby type noises. I
tried to get him out but he kept rolling up and trying to bite his
rear end. I got him straight to the vet and she sedated him and put
cream on his rear and gave him antibiotic injections and pain
killers. When he was sedated, she examined him and says that he is
badly bitten. He has bitten the base of his p*nis (dont know if
website will reject the word) and cloaca badly and she says she gives
him less than a 50% chance of recovery as all excretions have to
pass thru this area and will cause infection.
Has anyone ever had this experience? If so, how did things turn out?
I so desperately want to give him this chance but it will mean at
least a week or maybe 2 in the vets and the costs will be exorbitant
and if he doesn't make it..... I don't know what to do. I guess I am
hoping that someone has had a similar experience and can tell me a
it was a good outcome.
He is in a cage on his own and has been for about a year now -
happily. I have a female that needs a couple more months to reach
maturity that I wanted to pair with him. I have 9 other gliders and
their cages are all next to each other so he is not self mutilating
because he was unhappy. The vet said it could be because he doesn't
have a mate.

Any advice will be appreciated

Thanks
(Ps I live in South Africa so a phone contact wouldn't help)

You need to get an e-collar onto him right away so that he can't continue to go after himself. I'm going to try to get ahold of either Bourbon or Jen (Xfilefan) to come on here to give you more advice since I don't personally have experience with cloacal SM...
Please hang on... hopefully better help will be here soon

Do you have Yahoo IM?

I just talked to Bourbon and she said that it will be easier to help you with this if we can go through Yahoo IM...

sorry, no I don't.
Thanks for the help so far

do you have any type of instant messenger program??? do you know how to use the pm system here?

is he currently in an e-collar?

no I don't.
sorry I am not great at this!

Okay, in just a moment you will see a flashing envelope at the top of the screen, right next to where it says "My Stuff", when you see it, click on it & it will open up your PM (Personal Message) box...

no. the vet says she had to remove a small part of the penis and has castrated him as she says it will help with the swelling and healing but she said that if he starts biting again, she can't do much more for him. I do not have him at home, he is at the vets right now so he can be monitored. I just need to know if he is going to survive this or what the chances are?

IF he gets an e-collar on, he has a 90% chance of survival! PLEASE get a collar on him right away!!! Without the collar, the glider WILL go after himself and WILL die! I don't want to give you a panic, but this is the fact. Monitoring him is NOT enough!

ok, I will tell the vet. Is there a way to make the collar if she does not know what it is?

There are instructions on how to make one to fit a glider here: http://www.sugarglider.net/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/ubb/showflat/Number/69788#Post69788

Moonz328, For some reason I am not getting my pm's, i just deleted about 100 of them, and still nothing

so with that being said.. I need to know the extent of the damage? is it just the penal area or was it further down into the cloacal opening or stomach cavity?

I am please d that the vet is following through with all of the recommendations, it will be okay..

depending on the amount of damage, would depend on whether or not he would be better at home, being away from you could cause him much more stress, and I am not sure whether someone will be able to watch him every minute as you would, also I am concerned regarding his feeding.. since he needs to eat tonight

an UPDATE for those reading, keeping in mind she is in Africa with the only contact being the pm system and this thread, ...

I have contacted mary and charlie and they are going to contact her through the pm system, their vet is the top vets in the country regarding the cloacal damage, if we can somehow set up a phone consult between her vet and Dr fronfield or Dr antonoff, sorry about the spellings. then we have a great chance of not only saving this glider but having wonderful results with the surgery to help him early.

for the others reading this, this type of sm is by far the worst, the E-collar will be the difference between life and death, he has already removed it once at the vets, but he did not do any damage, they caught it immediately and replaced it.

The next problem that they are having to deal with is infection, since the damage not only was on the penis, but into the cloacal area as well.

I would like to ask that this thread kept open and not moved, so that we can have open contact with her till at the minimum after a vet consult is done between them.

moonz-you are in the best hands possible with this-please follow all of Bourbon and Mary & Charlie's advice, and I know your little guy will come through this. Mine did.

My prayers for your little guy, you are working with the best people available on this board.

Thanks everybody for your kind words and thoughts. Bourbon and Suz have been brilliant.
I am sitting here with tears running down my face!
I will let you know how things go.

Moonz328 you and your baby are in my prayer's. I can just imagine how hard this would be.

Moonz, I hope your fellow is okay. PLEASE keep us updated! My male is an SM (not as bad as yours, by no means) anyway, I know how hard it is on you too, I didn't eat for 3 days. Bourbon, Mary & Suz will guide you. I wish you the best of luck and will be thinking of you.

and Prayers for you and your little one! I know the feeling of helplessness when your little one just doesn't understand that what he's doing is actually making him worse.

Any updates?

Moonz328, Sending you tons of (((((hugs)))))! Prayers are here for you and lots of support, care and concern for you and your little one. Your being advised by the best of the best so please take comfort in knowing that everyone here will be there for you and your little one.
We are all hopeing to hear from you soon.....

I just wanted to step in and say what a great glider mom you are. You quick response going straight to the vet gave your little man the best chance at getting thru this. Then to come here and ask for help, I have faith all should go well for you both ((HUG))

At this point, I am going to move this thread over to Health & Hygiene...

Hi everyone,

Thank you all for your thoughts and well wishes.

I was away for the long weekend. I had a family event that was really bad timing but I couldn't get out of it. I was in daily contact with my vet and I have really good news. My Alfie is recovering very well.
Alfie has kept his ecollar on all the time (since the first time he managed to get it off!). My vet had to do a little more surgery on him yesterday as the skin around the cloaca was closing over and he was battling to pass faeces and some of the skin was dead so she removed that. He is eating well and has even picked up 2 grams!
My vet is really happy with his progress and said I could bring him home in a couple of days. We haven't discussed treatment after I bring him home but I will find out what I need to keep an eye out for before then. Any suggestions?

Thank you so much, especially Suz, Bourbon and Mary, for your help and concern - it is really appreciated.

That's wonderful news! I am so glad to hear he's doing better!

GREAT NEWS!

Please continue to update us!

I'm glad to hear he's doing well!

Thank You for the update! It is always such a relief to hear situations like this turn out with a happy ending! Most of the thanks go out to you for taking quick action, and following the advice from those who helped. Your a great mom and your little one is one lucky glider to have you. Hope to hear more good updates, and we sure would love to see pics. As for suggestions on what to give, I'll leave that up to those who have already been assisting you thru this so far. My thoughts and prayers are with you.