Swollen rat! Please Help!

Question
Hello, I left my house on Saturday and I just returned home today (Monday) and I noticed my little rattie girl was not as active as usual. I noticed that both her left front and back foot are swollen. The back foot is only swollen on the top of the foot, but she still runs on it. Her front foot she keeps curled up and will not use at all. Whatever happened to her must have happened in the last two days because I had my dad watching her at home. Her cage has 4 levels and I am not sure if this is a result of her falling or if something is seriously wrong. Please help me if you can, I am so worried about my little girl, especially because I just lost my other little girl last week. Thank you.

Answer
What color are the limbs that are swollen? They are not blue or purple tinged are they?


She may have fallen....does she live alone in the cage?

Is she eating and drinking ok? How old is she?

Are the levels in the cage enclosed or open that she can fall straight down?  See my list of cages that are safe and unsafe on this page:

http://www.freewebs.com/crittercity/gettingstarted.htm

If this is a result of injury, we will need to get her in a single story cage where she has no choice but to stay immobile, unless you can remove the ramps from her tall cage and isolate her to the bottom of the big cage. The less she moves the better. You need to feed the swollen limbs and make sure they can at least move around and are not broken but I am more concerned right now about the color of them at this point to rule out lack of oxygen. What did her cagemate pass away from?