Halothane

Question
QUESTION: Hi sandra,
What are your opinions or experiences with Halothane as method of euthanasia for rats? I do not have any rats needing to be put down however I am researching this for when the time comes. Taking my rats to the vet for euthanasia is stressful and I hate moving them out of their comfortable warm surroundings and into the car to move into a strange environment for there last moments.  I would only do a home euthanasia if I found evidence it was 100% safe and humane.

I came across it here :
http://www.rmca.org/Articles/euthanasia.htm

Thank you for your time

ANSWER: I absolutely disagree with the use of home euthansia. Too much can go wrong and the final outcome could be very painful and tramatic for your rat.  Inhalantans are very volatile and cause burning of the lungs.  The most humane method is to put the rat under a general anesthesia such as using isoflurane and the vet will inject the rat, either in the abdomen or sometimes in the heart.  As long as the rat is under anesthesia they will feel NOTHING. You can be with your rat the entire time if you want, and in fact you can insist on it if you want, but again, never let any vet put your rat to sleep unless he is under anesthsia such as isoflurane. Even heavy sedation is NOT ENOUGH.

We have to be educated on this topic as much as it is sad to think about, but I am glad you asked about it.

Using halothane may be made to sound like a peaceful experience, what your rat is going through is not peaceful.  The rat becomes paralyzed and while you assume he is falling asleep, he is really unable to move and is becoming Hypoxic. His heart will start to pound rapidly and he will more than likely die from heart attack from the over dose of halothane. This is not humane nor is it a nice peaceful thing for him to endure.  

There is no evidence to prove that home euthanasia is safe or humane. Its best to let a Vet do it once they explain  the procedure, which should be as I described above.

I have had over 50 rats put to sleep over the years and it has always been fast and painless. The worst part is when they are sick and having me make the decision when its time to do it. I usually call it the "death ride" because I end up racing to the ER clinic at midnight with a rat over my shoulder gasping for his breath or sometimes limp and lifeless after suffering a stroke or heart attack.  I wish all of our rats would pass away in their sleep peacfully, but these rats are fighters to the end and will not stop until they have no more strength to fight. They are an inspiration to us all in many ways.  Rats are brave and loving little creatures. I wish I could help all of them!

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QUESTION: That's a good insight thank you. I would never go ahead with anything unless I had fully researched. I have had 2 very hard passings, one a panicked respitory failure after what seemed to be a stroke very sudden. A second one of the se thing it was the mother of the last and she passed on the way to the vet. The first paniked passing was tramatizing and I did all I could to try and ease her distress. It occured fast but not calmly until the very last moments.   I am lucky (as I have discouverdd they are not always so common) to have had very peaceful passing in my arms of old age as well.

I am aware of proper veterinary euthanasia steps but I want to learn which drugs/ enhalents are best. I want to do only th best thing for my rats at every stage of life. I was recently at your site and the part about euthanasia was not present. I apperciate your knowledge thank you


Happy New year   ANSWER: Your right, I think I took the part on proper euthanasia out....but I will make sure it is up there thanks to you. There are many people that are unaware of proper procedure when putting a rat down so its important to get the info out there. I am aware of the other websites that have a page on home euthanasia and there have been several Vets attempting to remove this information as well as another self proclaimed rat experts inaccurate and actually very dangerous advice.  

Halothane is a scheduled drug and illegal to obtain without a prescription so in the first place, telling people to get it if they can is leaving the door open to some unethical activities.

I am glad you did your homework first. I have had people write to me asking if it was inhumane to put their dying rat in a plastic bag and attach it to the tail pipe of their car to gas it to death, or put it in the freezer.  I am horrified to find they have found this advice on rat lovers sites and again, have had several Vet friends contact the proper authorities, namely State board of Veterinarians or the DEA in an attempt to have this type of info removed.  Sadly, not enough protection is out there for the welfare of rats, but if it were about a dog or cat you can bet that info would be removed pronto, oh and of course freedom of speech prevails!

I know all too well about losing rats during a panic when they become hypoxic. I have held rats close to me while they fight for every breath.  Over the years I have been able to tell if the rat has any chance of recovering and have let them go before they really get to that point, but I am not always that lucky.  The worst was when I had an oxygen generator for one of my boys that had heart disease. He had to live in an aquarium with oxygen pumped in 24-7.  He was happy, ate well and looking at him you would never know he was sick, but if you took him out of the oxygenated environment, he would immediately become cyanotic and would begin to gasp. I felt guilty all the time but because he did so well in his little glass house, I did not have the heart to put him  down.  A few months down the road I heard a terrible sound coming from the 02 generator.  It was hot and had a smell like the motor was burning. I had to unplug it. Within minutes I was racing my sweet Jack to the ER vet and he had to be put to sleep.  I never got the 02 generator fixed after that because I felt I was not being fair to Jack by keeping him confined to a 10 gal. aquarium with 02 being piped in. He could not come out to play. I could not hold him or keep the lid off his tank long only to feed him and pet him for a minute or two. It was no life and i was being selfish.  I never wanted to  do that again to any rat so now I have an 02 generator I paid hundreds for just sitting in the corner of the rat room collecting dust. I think I will fix it just for cases such as acute respiratory infections but if any rat becomes chronic like that again, I will never keep them alive because I did not have the heart to let them go.  Not sure what this has to do with the topic at hand but it just brought back memories thinking about losing rats during panic episodes.

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QUESTION: Its my greatest fear for them to leave in a panic attack, but your saying "These rats are fighters to the end and will not stop until they have no more strength to fight. They are an inspiration to us all in many ways.  Rats are brave and loving little creatures." Helps me a with the fact of what happened, I never looked at it quite that way.

Your story is heart wrenching. I understand though. I have found with my rats more so than with any other animal I've had you must make hard decisions. Its really not fair to give such large personalities to such small health prone animals.

Actually your story reminded me of another topic I was considering and that was actually purchasing and setting up a small O2 box, not as a cage but as a oxygen box if someone is having a bad respiratory day. I have two rats with chronic myco who are on a lifetime of medication. Funny thing is one is an inbred rescue and one is from a reputable breeder and they both end up with the same problem albeit the bred one got it much later. I guess you never know.

Anyways it makes me wonder if its possible to use a small oxygen tank like some elderly people carry with them and hook it to a plastic transport box to try and relieve the gasps to get to the vet and put them down humanly. If you know anything about setting this up please let me know,
Thanks again

Answer
Having an emergency tank is a good idea, but you will need to purchase something bigger than the portable tanks since they only last a few hours at a time and begin to run out of 02.  If you check Craigs list you can find a good price on an 02 generator. Its easy to set up. Simply get an aquarium and a lid for it...if its a screen, you will want to put foil over it to keep the 02 in.  I started out this way too, but when Jack got sick, he moved in to live in the tank and I could not take him out of it after that.

However, just to use long enough for the rat to start to recover during an illness that causes respiratory distress is fine and will save tons upon  tons of money rather than paying your vet to do it.   I also suggest looking into buying a nebulizer.  Nebbing baytril, steroids and albuterol are great ways to get  this into the rats system fast.

I bought my 02 generator and nebulizer from Ebay years back when it was legal to buy and sell medical equipment without a prescription but now its not allowed.  I think Craigs list is different and in fact you can almost sell your soul on that thing.  lol