Afrin and Rabbits

Question
Dear Sarah,
I hope you can help me with this question, although I feel it is a fairly odd one. My female Dutch Rabbit was diagnosed with an upper respiratory infection. My vet first prescribed her with Baytril in the form of a pill, which ended up giving her diarrea so it was discontinued. He now prescribed Vetrachloracin, an eye ointment commonly used in dogs and cats, as he claimed it would run down into her nasal cavitiy if administered into the eye. He also instructed me to pick up neosynephrine from the local drugstore...Kroger informed me that neosynephrine was no longer in production yet said that Afrin (the nasal spray) was the exact same thing and gave me that instead. My vet said to go ahead and use the Afrin...I'm a little apprehensive and was wondering if you could offer any advice! Thanks!

- Stephanie

Answer
If the vet said to go ahead, and you know s/he is a knowledgeable rabbit vet, I would trust it. If you are still not sure, I would advise contacting a pharmacy and asking if there are any differences between the two medications. Let them know you were advised by a vet to use it on your rabbit, but are apprehensive about it. Explain that you need to know if there are even small differences, or if it is basically the same product. Pharmacists are usually more knowledgable about medications than even doctors, so they can be an invaluable resource.