Neiths broken jaw

Question
QUESTION: Hello,

My poor little rat Neith has been through the wars recently. Just over a week ago, we found her looking very sorry for herself all fluffed up and with a swollen eye. We took her to the vets the next day by which time the whole side of her face was swollen and the eye was practically popping out. The vet had a look and said it looked like she'd fallen and hit her face - she had broken one of her teeth off as well. We were shown how to give her oral pain killer daily, oral antibiotics and also an antibiotic eye drop. The vet suspected that she would probably lose the eye. She seemed to perk up considerably after the pain killer and a couple of days later her face had gone down (except for the eye itself) and she seemed almost her normal self. Toward the end of the week we weighed her and discovered she'd lost about 40 grams. I then realised that whilst she was interested in food, she would take it with her paws and not her mouth and then just lick at it. Also, I hadn't seen her yawn or open her mouth at all really. Suspecting something else was wrong we took her back to the vet. Now that the swelling had gone down the vet was able to feel around and we discovered that she had in fact broken her jaw. Her front teeth are crooked now and the tops miss the bottoms completely. The vet said as long as we could get her on a soft food diet and have her teeth clipped regularly she should be happy enough. She's still on the pain killers for now, because the eye is still swollen. It's been a couple of days and I cannot get her to eat at all. She is still drinking water, but even when I offer her very soggy food she could lick up, like yogurt, she has a sniff but then decides no. Today I have also discovered that she is starting with a mammary tumour...I suspect it's not malignant, I can pinch around it - but it's only going to sap her strength further. I want to do everything I can for her but I'm beginning to believe it would be kinder to have her put to sleep. Do you think this is the right course of action? Or is there anything else I could try? She is two years old next month. I understand that this is a good age for a rat, but in sixteen years of keeping rats I have been really lucky and often had them reach two and half, three and in one case four years old without any problems! I want to know I've tried everything before I let her go.

Thankyou,
Andrea.

ANSWER: I just have to ask, how did your rat break her jaw?  This is so uncommon due to all of the cartilage in that area that it makes me wonder if your vet is misunderstanding malocclusion and thinking she has a broken jaw?

Malocclusion is when the rats jaw is misaligned, not by a break but it is a birth defect. This eventually causes the teeth to grow sideways and can rub the roof of the mouth causing abscesses and sores.  It also causes the teeth to break off as well. Sometimes it can be so bad the abscess can actually cause pressure within the rats eye, which may be what has happened to your rats eye.  What your describing to me, including the inability to chew or open her mouth, sounds identical to malocclusion.   

Malocclusion can be treated simply by having the rats teeth trimmed every few weeks because this will never go away since it is caused by irregular growth of the rats jaw.  

Is your vet a certified exotic specialist or a vet that sees dogs cats and exotics as a special side interest?  There are 110 of these vets in the world with 100 of them in the US alone and the other 10 scattered about the rest of the world, having possibly 2 or 3 in the UK alone so its hard to find a bonafied certified exotic vet.  Not that I doubt your vets word, but it is pretty odd a rat has a broken jaw.


As for putting her down, under these circumstances, I feel that she will be fine with having her teeth trimmed and once this is under control she should be ok.  The eye can also be safely removed to stop infection. I have cared for rats that have gone through enucleation and have had my own rat have to have an eye removed due to infection and he adjusted as if nothing had ever happened to him.  I lost him this past June at close to 3 years old.  He lived a nice life with only one eye.

If you think perhaps you would like another opinion from another vet I would be happy to give you names of vets in your area that can help.  No obligation of course.

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Hello,

Thankyou for your time. Our vet generally sees dogs, cats and horses but has a lot of experience with small animals as well - she also keeps her own pet rats.

I think the reason we suspect a broken jaw is because it all happened very suddenly - literally fine one day and not the next. I don't know how quickly malocclusion can go from being symptomless to causing a lot of trouble - but otherwise your diagnosis does have all the same symptoms. I'd taken some pictures of Isis and Neith sniffing at the camera a couple of days before whatever happened did - as far as I can see, her teeth looked perfectly aligned at that point in time. They do have a tall cage (about a metre high) and there are lots of perches and rope ladder and things. There is also a ceramic food bowl and some wooden chew toys on the floor of the cage. Neith was starting to get a bit clumsy - I've seen her miss jumps a couple of times in the past month. Is it possible she fell from the top of the cage and hit one of the toys in the bottom to cause this sort of damage?

The good news is I've managed to get her to eat a bit now - unfortunately she likes cottage cheese above anything else I've tried, but I know I can't give her too much of that because of the protein! We have got her booked in at the vet next week to sort her eye out and check her teeth.

Thankyou for your advice,
Andrea.

Answer

Hi Andrea


It would take a heck of a bang to really break her jaw. Its hard to say without an xray, which should be done to be honest, just so you can see if there is an abscess behind that eye as well.

Check out some photos of what malocclusion can do and yes, it can happen fast. Unless you check their teeth every single day, its hard to notice anything is wrong until it finally causes problems such as broken teeth or abscesses from constant rubbing of the teeth.



Check out the links to these photos:

http://ratguide.com/health/figures/images/abscess/mallocclusion2.jpg

http://ratguide.com/health/figures/images/teeth/Ariteeth.jpg