Author: Nicholle Stoller
of Chin Central
Glucose Seizure
Never has anything terrified me more than when I walked in to my room and found Stormy in the throes of a seizure. These things always happen after the chinchilla vet closes, so I decided to wait and see if it would just pass. I gave him a ground up calcium tablet mixed with pineapple juice in a syringe and gave him that in case it was calcium or glucose deficiency.
The seizures continued, He twitched constantly but every 10-15 minutes he had a grand mal where all of the muscles contract out of sync, this is the most well known type of seizure although not necessarily the most common.
It finally got to the point where he was completely exhausted between seizures. He'd had enough and so had I. I took him to the emergency vet that finally opened. The vet explained that pretty much the only thing they could do was test his blood and make sure he didn't have a deficiency of some kind. He had been acting normal and had not had any changes in diet for quite a while.
Luckily he was cooperative for the blood draw. Not that he had much of a choice but it made it quicker.
His results were
|
Normal Range | Stormy's Level | |
Calcium 4.4-10.0 | 4.82 | |
Glucose 89-163 | 50.7 |
His calcium level was at the low end of the range but was still within tolerance safe levels. His glucose on the other hand was much too low. This could be caused by him not eating enough or by an infection.
His penalty is that he gets to have pineapple juice and I get to wake up in the middle of the night to make sure he feeds his face. He's also getting a low dose of an antibiotic in case of infection. He has an appointment with the chin vet on Monday.
I'm writing this just an hour after we arrived home from the vet's office. He's no longer having seizures but still has muscle spasms. Poor guy. He's completely exhausted.
|
|
