Abscess in eye

[BreeBiscuit]

This is quite a story, so thanks in advance if you read the entire thing. I have a bunny, Momo, who I got after one of my sibling’s friends gave her to me because her other rabbit was not getting along with her. About 2 months after I started taking care of her, I went on an out of town trip and my father watched her. When I came back she refused to open her right eye, I took her to a local vet and they prescribed some eye drops. After a week or so on these I noticed a white spot on her eye. Nothing too big or anything and none of her habits changed; she was normal for the most part. But I decided to switch vets as I was questioning their experience with rabbits.

I took her to a rabbit savvy vet who guessed it was an abscess and prescribed Baytril; this didn’t work and for the first time it a few weeks it began to get larger. So we head back in and get Azithromycin which stops the growth and begins to shrink it. But now my vet says that it’s no longer an issue and urges me to ignore it for a while, at least until after she gets spayed.

We talked a bit about aspirating the abscess when she’s spayed so she only has to go under once, but this was no longer considered an issue at this point, because we believed the risks outweighed the benefits.

I went along with this and after a week off the medicine her abscess gets larger again and this time clouds her eye to the point of looking like a cataract. After another vet visit, I learn that her iris is no longer working and they plan to take out her eye if the next round of medicine does not affect the abscess. We just had a check up earlier this week and the vet believe her eye is cloudier, but he’s hesitant to remove it. He says he wants to take her off the medicine completely and see what happens, then he’ll decide if eye removal is necessary.

So, I guess I’m looking for more opinions? Does this seem right to you all? If at all possible I would definitely like to avoid a surgery, but if it’s necessary then of course I’m willing to undergo whatever. The only issue is that my family and I have been taking pictures and we all believe that the abscess is getting smaller and fading into the cloudiness if that makes sense, but I have no idea what that means. My vet also claims that she isn’t in any pain, but he doesn’t want this to take a turn for the worst and develop into a larger issue.

[jerseygirl]

Posted By BreeBiscuit on 11/24/2016 8:59 PM

This is quite a story, so thanks in advance if you read the entire thing. I have a bunny, Momo, who I got after one of my sibling’s friends gave her to me because her other rabbit was not getting along with her. About 2 months after I started taking care of her, I went on an out of town trip and my father watched her. When I came back she refused to open her right eye, I took her to a local vet and they prescribed some eye drops. After a week or so on these I noticed a white spot on her eye. Nothing too big or anything and none of her habits changed; she was normal for the most part. But I decided to switch vets as I was questioning their experience with rabbits.

I took her to a rabbit savvy vet who guessed it was an abscess and prescribed Baytril; this didn’t work and for the first time it a few weeks it began to get larger. So we head back in and get Azithromycin which stops the growth and begins to shrink it. But now my vet says that it’s no longer an issue and urges me to ignore it for a while, at least until after she gets spayed.

We talked a bit about aspirating the abscess when she’s spayed so she only has to go under once, but this was no longer considered an issue at this point, because we believed the risks outweighed the benefits.

I went along with this and after a week off the medicine her abscess gets larger again and this time clouds her eye to the point of looking like a cataract. After another vet visit, I learn that her iris is no longer working and they plan to take out her eye if the next round of medicine does not affect the abscess. We just had a check up earlier this week and the vet believe her eye is cloudier, but he’s hesitant to remove it. He says he wants to take her off the medicine completely and see what happens, then he’ll decide if eye removal is necessary.

So, I guess I’m looking for more opinions? Does this seem right to you all? If at all possible I would definitely like to avoid a surgery, but if it’s necessary then of course I’m willing to undergo whatever. The only issue is that my family and I have been taking pictures and we all believe that the abscess is getting smaller and fading into the cloudiness if that makes sense, but I have no idea what that means. My vet also claims that she isn’t in any pain, but he doesn’t want this to take a turn for the worst and develop into a larger issue.

To be honest, these 3 things make me question this vet.  I would be seeking an appointment with another or an opthalmologist vet that has rabbit experience. 

Where exactly is the abscess?

Where the antibiotics prescribed oral or topical? 

Are you able to post some of the pictures?

[BreeBiscuit]

I don’t know the exact location, but the antibiotics have all been oral.

Here are some pictures; the first is after she began the baytril, and the second was the day I was told about removing her eye.

[jerseygirl]

It looks like it’s moved. Do you think?

Had the vet mentioned uveitis and the parasite e.cuniculi at all? I’m not sure if it looks typical of uveitis (maybe the beginning stages) but I notice there is some smokiness over the pupil also…

Was there any evidence of a scratch or other injury initially on the cornea?

Steroidal meds are not typically used for rabbits in general, but they can be used safely for the eye. It should help with inflammation and any pain if there is any.
Something to ask the vet about?

[bunzmcfunz]

Like Jersey Girl said, ask about EC. My rabbit has a very similar white spot that we discovered when she was holding her eye closed. The vet we took her to passed it off as “just a cataract” likely caused by a scratch. Years later it turns out she had EC all along and it’s only recently shown other symptoms.

[BreeBiscuit]

We also noticed it looked like it was moving around, and the vet has mentioned a possibility of e.cuniculi but he passed over it pretty quickly, to not “scare anyone”. I haven’t heard about uveitis so I’ll look into that and ask about it.

My current vet hasn’t mentioned seeing anything like a scratch, and the first vet had no clue what they were looking at or for (which is why I initially switched) so that could be another possibility too. When I left her with my father, he left her to roam around unsupervised so she could have gotten into something.

While she was on the first round of azithromycin she also had steroidal eye drops. I have some leftover, but the vet hasn’t mentioned using them anymore, just the oral doses of azithromycin.

[bunzmcfunz]

From what I’ve read and been told by our vet, EC doesn’t always cause problems in rabbits and the treatment is preventative of the EC getting out of control. Strange he would pass over it so quickly, but I guess EC is still technically a controversial topic. Still, this is coming from someone currently dealing with the effects of EC, so I’m kind of biased, I’d personally think it would be better to be proactive than have any other symptoms happen later in your buns life. Here’s a site with a lot of information, including the tests that can show if your bun has EC: http://www.dechra.co.uk/therapy-areas/companion-animal/exotics/antiparasitics-antifungals/disease-information/e-cuniculi

There are a lot of other sites out there, this one just had a lot of info about the tests and treatments

Hope I’m not scaring you! Lol it just sounds and looks similar to what our girl developed two years ago (swollen eye with a milky spot) and now we’re kicking ourselves for trusting a not so rabbit savvy vet. Like I said, some buns never develop any severe symptoms, so I wouldn’t get super worried right now.

If it was a scratch, which is totally possible, the steroids would help heal it but the white spot might stay, if the vet prescribed them for a certain amount of days I’d use them just for that time. I kind of feel like there’s always meds left over because pets (especially rabbits) can be hard to give them to. Sorry to write a book!

[BreeBiscuit]

Posted By bunzmcfunz on 11/25/2016 12:30 PM

From what I’ve read and been told by our vet, EC doesn’t always cause problems in rabbits and the treatment is preventative of the EC getting out of control. Strange he would pass over it so quickly, but I guess EC is still technically a controversial topic. Still, this is coming from someone currently dealing with the effects of EC, so I’m kind of biased, I’d personally think it would be better to be proactive than have any other symptoms happen later in your buns life. Here’s a site with a lot of information, including the tests that can show if your bun has EC: http://www.dechra.co.uk/therapy-areas/companion-animal/exotics/antiparasitics-antifungals/disease-information/e-cuniculi

There are a lot of other sites out there, this one just had a lot of info about the tests and treatments

Hope I’m not scaring you! Lol it just sounds and looks similar to what our girl developed two years ago (swollen eye with a milky spot) and now we’re kicking ourselves for trusting a not so rabbit savvy vet. Like I said, some buns never develop any severe symptoms, so I wouldn’t get super worried right now.

If it was a scratch, which is totally possible, the steroids would help heal it but the white spot might stay, if the vet prescribed them for a certain amount of days I’d use them just for that time. I kind of feel like there’s always meds left over because pets (especially rabbits) can be hard to give them to. Sorry to write a book!

I was definitely thinking that some preventative measures would be a good idea, and thank you for the link it was very informative. I was pretty curious about how exactly this is tested for and diagnosed, but that clears some things up.

In my opinion it’s scarier not knowing what’s happening, so no worries there; it’s nice to get insight from others going through similar problems. 

I have a check in scheduled for the second week of December, her eye seems to be getting better but at worst it’s just staying the same we think. Do you guys think this is urgent enough to call in for an earlier appointment or just follow the schedule. I want to trust our vet, but I don’t want to let this sit until it gets worse, you know?

[bunzmcfunz]

I think as long as her eye isn’t getting any worse and she doesn’t have any other symptoms it should be okay. I’m glad that link was useful though, and I definitely agree not knowing is awful. It sounds like you’re on top of it and keeping a pretty close watch already. I hope your next appointment goes well.

[BreeBiscuit]

I’m just popping back in to give an update; we went back to the vet today for a checkup. We just finished her last dose of the antibiotics over the weekend and her eye was looking great, the abscess had shrunk a lot, but the vet says the pressure in her eye is over 50 so they opted to take it out this afternoon.

[jerseygirl]

I hope she’s doing okay! {{{Momo}}}
Do keep us updated.

[BreeBiscuit]

She’s been back home for a few hours now and is getting around pretty well. We were a bit worried she wouldn’t eat for a while but it almost looks like she came back with a bigger appetite, which is funny. We got some oral antibiotics to give her 2x a day, so hopefully she’ll heal up soon with no problems!

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