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Vet appt. Wed. (Help w/any information I ask re: proper treatment)

22 10:00:40

Question
Hello Dana and welcome back.  One of our rescue bunnies, a 6-7 yr. old New Zealand has been scratching/biting herself for over a month.  She did lose her long-time partner but that was 1-2 months before that.

Sugar would be fine, then start up again so I took her to the vet a couple of weeks ago.  I was given Hibitane cream to put on the little bumps on her back AFTER the vet shaved the fur off (poor thing looked awful).  Fur still not grown fully back but the bumps seem to have dried up mostly.  

She seemed to calm down with the scratching/licking but still in the last week or so has made a couple of nickle sized spots reddish and a bit of the skin broken as she began doing it again.  There are also a couple of areas where I can feel tiny bumps under the fur.  The vet may want to shave those areas too but they're in vulnerable places (between front legs, as far as I know)and I'm afraid her skin may get cut besides the stress on her.  

I want to ask the vet to do a skin scraping but again I'm worried about that.  I guess the vet didn't think it was mites but not sure.  'Sugar' is eating fine and she does sleep soundly at times so she's not at herself constantly.  Seems normal most of the time but I want to get to the bottom of this.  She doesn't like me putting cream on as there's a scent to it and we are scent free in this house.  She licks it off anyway.  

What can I suggest to the vet for this problem?  My appt. is on April 7, early afternoon.  I can't see any fleas. The vet originally thought it was because of losing her partner in early January but I find that hard to believe at this time.

Can you help?

Thank you,
Paula Grundy

Answer
Dear Paula,

Though you can't always see mites, they might well be present.  It would be safe to try Revolution (selamectin) to see if this helps the problem.  Some burrowing mites are very hard to visualize, but can cause great misery.  Revolution will kill them.  If the Revolutionn doesn't work, you haven't lost much, and will have eliminated the possibility that this is caused by mites you can't see.

Hope this helps.

Dana