Critical Care

[Rookie]

Rookie has taken a turn for the worse and I have to know give him Critical Care x3 a day. I feel like my first try was a bit of a fail…does it take a really long time for everyone else too? And is it really messy?
I have a hard time finding his mouth and he keeps pushing it out with his tongue. So he ends up being baby messy….lol
Can he continously swallow it? Or does he need a pause to swallow and kind of chew? I took a lot of pauses and it took a long time to give it to him.
Any tricks and advice to make it as easy and as painless for him as possible?

[Bam]

It’s normal for it to get very messy and for quite a lot of CC to end up on the bunny’s chest and chin and on the human – and possible even on the furniture. The bun does need to be allowed time to chew and swallow between mouthfuls. The last thing you want is for him to choke on it.

It does take time, but it gets easier with practice. Even though it’s impractical, it’s a good sign that the bunny fights his CC and meds. Fighting spirit is important. You can mix the CC with something yummy to make the bun more willing to eat it. You can use baby fruit- or berry- or veg purée, or canned plain pumpkin (not pie filling). In some cases the bun will even eat the CC from a plate or spoon if you mix it with something delicious.

[Rookie]

Do you ever mix some of the medication into the critical care? Or is it hard to control dosage that way since you can’t control how much ends up all over you and the bunny? Rookie now has to get 2 syringes in the mouth, one injection in the back in the morning and night and one extra syringe in the mouth in the middle of the day PLUS critical care each time he gets any medication.

[Bam]

It is hard to control the amount thats get into the bunny if you mix the meds with the food. Whether it’s a good idea or not rather depends on the med. Antibiotics should be given in the prescribed doses, but motility drugs and pain-killers (metacam-type painkillers) don’t have to be quite as exact.

Poor little darling, and poor you too. It isn’t easy but it does get easier with practice. I once had to feed a bun CC 3 times a day for more than 3 weeks and he was SO angry – he even bit me in the tummy once, really hard. But when the whole ordeal was over, he “forgave” me completely. It was like we had bonded for real.

[vanessa]

I fed critical care to Lancelot for many weeks. He would push it out with his tongue and get it everywhere. I just gathered it back up, and kept feeding him. I was supposed to get 6 Tbsp critical care (with 12Tbsp water) a day. I found it easier to use the large 35cc puppy syringes, and I added a bit more than 12Tbsp water, to get it to a consistency that was easy to suck up with the syringe. My goal was 2 syringes per feeding until I had used up the daily portion, and I also followed every feeding session with 1 or 2 syringes of plain water, or water with apple juice, if he was refusing to drink. I always gave the medicine FIRST, in a small 1cc medicine syringe, to ensure I could deliver the meds quickly, and not have it go everywhere like the critical care. I would feed him on my lap, sitting on a puppy pee pad, to help keep my clothes clean, and I always had a warm wet gar to clean my hands as I fed him. I would scoop up the mess off his fur as he spat it out and return it to the “mess syringe”, so that he still got his 2 syringes per feeding, and when I was done, I’d use the wet rag to clean his fur from the mess. These days, I use the critical care to bake hay cookies. I still struggle to keep his weight up, but since his appetite is great, I don’t syringe feed him anymore, I just give him lots of critical care hay cookies that I dehydrated (not baked), with parsley, carrots, and banana.

I’d seriously recommend doing the meds first in a separate syringe.

[kirstyol]

It takes a bit of getting used to for both buns and humans. Bramble now sort of accepts his syringe feeding when he needs it but it wasn’t always that easy. Its a lot easier with two people one to hold and one to feed, you are aiming to get the syringe behind his first set of front teeth – go in from the side. if someone else is holding your bun for you don’t let them be tempted to hold him on his back, bunnies can aspirate although it is rare (that’s when something that’s supposed to go in the tummy accidentally goes in the lungs) Don’t worry too much about getting some of the CC on your bun, they are very clean animals as you know and will almost certainly lick it off and therefore eat it. he needs a pause to chew and swallow, I was really worried about this when we first started syringe feeding so asked my vet how much to give at a time and she said around a millilitre at a time then pause for a few seconds.

[Aaron]

Sebastian hated the syringe when he had stasis, (he thankfully is in recovery). He would flinch and shake and just freak out. I mashed up a bit of banana in there to help the taste, but I can tell he really hated the syringe. Don’t worry as kirstyol said about it getting on him, as soon as you are done, he will probably run and clean himself off for a good 3 minutes. Does he have stasis? That is what I was presuming. If so, what other meds is he on, and do we know how this came on?

[Rookie]

sorry been busy with all this.. lots of meds…he was more recipient the second day as I too was a bit better at it myself. Rookie is now eating well again so I stopped giving him the CC. I ordered extra just in case.
I give him the meds separate to be safe.
Aaron…Rookie has a tooth abscess and he is waiting on surgery. He is on 1 per day injection of penicillin, 3 per day of metacam, and 2 per day of cisapride. and then on top of this came the 3 per day critical care. He now is eating normally for the past day and a half so I’m not pushing the CC on him at the moment but have it on stand by.

[LittlePuffyTail]

I’m glad to hear your boy is eating!

[Rookie]

me too. He got really excited about some Kale today. He has been very active all day. Seeing him like this makes me forget that he is sick then it breaks my heart to think of his upcoming surgery and the recovery.

[Rookie]

vanessa….the cookies you make from critical care..how do you make them?

[vanessa]

Here’s what I normally make:

2.5 cups critical care
1 banana
1 carrot
4 bunches parsely
1 cup water.

This is what I adapted from a recipe I found on the internet. Blend the banana and carrot. Chop the parsely (stems and al) into 2-inch pieces to make blending easier. Blend the parsley into the banana/carrot. Add the water.
Note – blenders are not all the same. Some perform better than others.

I don’t bake them. I use a small ice-cream scoop – I think it scoops 3/4 to 1 tsp at a time. I place about 160 little scoops in a food dehydrator on the lowest heat setting. 2 days later it is nice and dry.

For 160 cookies, 4 cookies = 1 Tbsp critical care. I have to do the math a few times over to be sure I got it right… 2.5 cup = 40 Tbsp. So number of cookies divided bt 40 = the number of cookies that it takes to feed 1 Tbsp critical care.

[Rookie]

Great thanks….I’ll give them a try. The vet gave us a good truck with CC…instead of the big syringe told me to use the little one…that’s one mouthful for Rookie…so I load the big syringe then I fill the little one from the big one to make it easy to refill.
It was easy cause it seemed Rookie was getting just enough to not have him push it back out with his tongue…except the little bugger refused to swallow the critical care or chew…so I wait then add more into his mouth and then out he spits it….come on! So then I waited till he started chewing it and swallowing it but it’s a waiting game cause he refuses to do it….

[vanessa]

Yeah they are little buggers about it. Whatever syringe size works for you is best. I tried the smaller syringe, but the refills were time consuming, and I found the critical care thickens, so when I’m ready for a reload – I need to shove it in the back end of the syringe, or add more water so I can suck it up, or just make less at a time. Either way – I find the larger syringes work for me.
Are you using warm or cold water? Lancelot prefers it with warm water. Sometimes I use apple juice (pure apple no additives) to add more flavor and help him want to cooperate.

[Rookie]

Filling a small syringe with the big one is quick and easy. I use warm water but by the time I give it to him it’s more of a room temp. I tried to add a bit of apple juice but still doesn’t like it.
He started eating a bit now. Keeps eating paper too

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