Post by Tressie on Jan 22, 2010 15:04:59 GMT -4
Its been hammered into my head dozens of times to always be super careful when administering medications.
Same thing goes with syringe feeding. It is always better to finger feed your ferret when necessary, than syringe feed them. They can lick the duk soup off your finger. It takes longer but it is infinitely safer.
Never give medications from the front. Always bring the syringe into the mouth from the side, at the back of the jaw and aim up at the roof of the mouth, NEVER aim at the back of the throat.
The serious risk is aspiration, which can lead to a difficult to treat pneumonia. The other risk is death, as this person who posted to the Ferret Health List (FHL) came close to causing.
BEGIN QUOTE: Re: [ferrethealth] Ferret aspirated prednisolone
Thank for your response and for everyone else who read and responded here and
off-list.
To recap and update:
Caesar gets 2.5 ml of Pred every other day along with Lukeran to help him keep
the progress of his lymphoma at bay. Last night while giving him his Pred he
gagged, then aspirated some of the Pred. He went into respiratory arrest and
lost consciousness immediately. I tried upside down back slapping and
centrifugal spinning to try and expel what he inhaled but I wasn't getting
anywhere, and he was limp and blue. I finally did mouth to mouth resuscitation,
starting with suction first. The suction left me with a strong taste of Pred in
my mouth, so I knew I was making progress. I proceeded with rescue breathing
combined with Heimlich-like chest compressions and he stiffened up and started
moving air. Before too long he was breathing normally again but seemed pretty
out of it.
This morning he was having some trouble breathing. His color was OK but he was
gasping for air. I took him to his vet first thing. He examined Caesar and did
radiographs. The good news is that the lungs look clear and healthy. He's there
now on low flow O2 so that he doesn't have to work as hard to stay oxygenated.
He likely has some upper respiratory irritation and swelling from the Pred but
we think that he will recover just fine. The radiographs revealed an enlarged
heart as well but that is probably age related, and it's good that we caught it
now so we can treat that along with all of his other issues.
The moral of this story is that I need to take my time when giving meds. I was
tired, impatient and in a hurry last night, and that might have been what caused
this to happen. It didn't take much Pred to nearly kill Caesar, and though I'm
hopeful that he will recover from this, it was completely preventable. So,
please take my advice and try not to let the routine of meds get to be too
routine. Don't let this happen to you. And, if you have a medical emergency, do
what makes sense and don't give up. I almost stopped last night - it seemed like
he was dead. He was blue, limp, and his mouth was open and his tongue was slack
and hanging out. I've seen a lot of dead ferrets and he looked dead to me. But I
remembered my CPR training and one of the most important things that's taught is
DON'T STOP until the victim begins breathing on their own (or until help
arrives). This may very well be the reason that Caesar is alive this morning.
Please keep him in your prayers.
Jack (END QUOTE)
Same thing goes with syringe feeding. It is always better to finger feed your ferret when necessary, than syringe feed them. They can lick the duk soup off your finger. It takes longer but it is infinitely safer.
Never give medications from the front. Always bring the syringe into the mouth from the side, at the back of the jaw and aim up at the roof of the mouth, NEVER aim at the back of the throat.
The serious risk is aspiration, which can lead to a difficult to treat pneumonia. The other risk is death, as this person who posted to the Ferret Health List (FHL) came close to causing.
BEGIN QUOTE: Re: [ferrethealth] Ferret aspirated prednisolone
Thank for your response and for everyone else who read and responded here and
off-list.
To recap and update:
Caesar gets 2.5 ml of Pred every other day along with Lukeran to help him keep
the progress of his lymphoma at bay. Last night while giving him his Pred he
gagged, then aspirated some of the Pred. He went into respiratory arrest and
lost consciousness immediately. I tried upside down back slapping and
centrifugal spinning to try and expel what he inhaled but I wasn't getting
anywhere, and he was limp and blue. I finally did mouth to mouth resuscitation,
starting with suction first. The suction left me with a strong taste of Pred in
my mouth, so I knew I was making progress. I proceeded with rescue breathing
combined with Heimlich-like chest compressions and he stiffened up and started
moving air. Before too long he was breathing normally again but seemed pretty
out of it.
This morning he was having some trouble breathing. His color was OK but he was
gasping for air. I took him to his vet first thing. He examined Caesar and did
radiographs. The good news is that the lungs look clear and healthy. He's there
now on low flow O2 so that he doesn't have to work as hard to stay oxygenated.
He likely has some upper respiratory irritation and swelling from the Pred but
we think that he will recover just fine. The radiographs revealed an enlarged
heart as well but that is probably age related, and it's good that we caught it
now so we can treat that along with all of his other issues.
The moral of this story is that I need to take my time when giving meds. I was
tired, impatient and in a hurry last night, and that might have been what caused
this to happen. It didn't take much Pred to nearly kill Caesar, and though I'm
hopeful that he will recover from this, it was completely preventable. So,
please take my advice and try not to let the routine of meds get to be too
routine. Don't let this happen to you. And, if you have a medical emergency, do
what makes sense and don't give up. I almost stopped last night - it seemed like
he was dead. He was blue, limp, and his mouth was open and his tongue was slack
and hanging out. I've seen a lot of dead ferrets and he looked dead to me. But I
remembered my CPR training and one of the most important things that's taught is
DON'T STOP until the victim begins breathing on their own (or until help
arrives). This may very well be the reason that Caesar is alive this morning.
Please keep him in your prayers.
Jack (END QUOTE)