Possible broken foot

[niapet]

Hey everyone,

The year of horror for squirrels here continues. Imp (9.5yo gray) seems to be injured. Yesterday he came out of his nest and just seems to be in serious pain. He makes a sort of half buzzing half squeaking sound (sounds very pitiful) when we try to handle him. He runs away and limps on his right foot. We tried to examine it and there are no obvious signs of a wound.

He has health issues, chronic ear infection and his teeth do not grow properly anymore. The top teeth are nubs and the bottom ones over grow (we have had to trim the bottom teeth over the past year often. It is important to point out Imp has NEVER been afraid of me. He will let me do just about anything, but now he freaks out when we try to handle him.

He has been sleeping in a blanket on the living-room couch since yesterday morning when, I made it up for him. This is also very unusual for him to do. It's clearly more comfortable than his nest but still, the fact that he is doing it is a sign something is very wrong.

We gave him Motrin and Tramadol yesterday and I gave him another dose this morning. It clearly helps because he slept ALL day yesterday and looked peaceful. It was very hard to get him to let us handle him to dose the meds, he still did not to bite us, he just tries to run away, which probably aggravates whatever is wrong.

We have NO VETS here that will see squirrels so this type of situation is very difficult. Any suggestions would be most appreciated.

[cava]

Are you willing/able to travel if someone can recommend a vet? Otherwise, all you can do is treat pain and hope for the best. Poor guy, I hope he feels better soon!

[Nancy in New York]

We have a member that works for a vet in Manchester, NH that sees squirrels.
Not sure how close that is to you.

[niapet]

Manchester NH is maybe 6 hours away. That may be the vet that helped us with Juniper. That relationship didn't really... work out well =/ if it is the same person. We are actually closer to Albany NY than NH. We are in western Massachusetts, close to the upstate NY boarder.

Edit:

It also worried me that we may have hurt him when we trimmed his teeth. Has anyone ever had teeth triming go wrong?> can the break inside the jaw? It didn't seem like this anything went wrong but my mind is going over everything that has happened in the past week that could have caused him pain. However, it's is most likely his foot, since tooth pain would not make him limp...

[cava]

Yes, you can trim too close and split the tooth lengthwise. Have you looked in his mouth? I agree, if he is limping or non weight bearing on his foot, it's probably not his tooth. He eating normally?

[niapet]

We have seen him eat since it happened, but his appetite has definitely decreased. We have to bring water to him because he just doesn't want to move. We can't really examine his mouth yet, its an ordeal just getting the medicine into him. If it were a split tooth is there anything that could even be done?



Has anyone seen this type of tooth issue in older squirrels, where the top teeth aren't really growing much but the bottom ones grow quickly? Or is that a sign of a calcium problem?

[HRT4SQRLS]

Sorry to say this but in an older squirrel it's a sign of odontoma. The tooth IS growing. It's growing backwards. :(

It can be ruled out with an X-ray.

[niapet]

Are there any other signs of this tumor? It doesn't look like they are growing backward but he HAS been in pain for some time now. We have asked on the boards about white tears before and we could never track down the culprit.

The information I was able to find called it a benign tumor. Is there a treatment for this condition? Is it extremely painful? Does it require euthanasia? I can not bear the though of imp being in pain like this. There are not vets that see squirrels in MA so getting Imp to a vet is difficult. He also dose NOT respond well to anyone but the two of us. He does not even like our daughter =/

[niapet]

I just did some reading on Odontoma and am very concerned. Imp does sneeze a lot and has discharge from his eyes. He also seems to have a chronic ear infection but I am now concerned this may be caused by the malformed teeth growing back into his skull. It has been several months that this has been an issue. We didn't really notice anything wrong until his bottom teeth became overgrown.

Imp does not live in a cage so he has never been an excessive chewer. He always occupied himself hiding and re-hiding food around the house. He never had the cage boredom issue so wasn't really much of a chewer. We always gave him treats of hazel nuts since they have a hard shell; we reasoned this would help keep his teeth healthy without him chewing all the furniture up. It did seem to work but I can't help but wonder if the years of opening such hard shells caused this issue.

If Imp is dying or in such pain he needs to be euthanized, this will be the third squirrel we have lost this year... Juniper, the paralyzed squirrel that we gave a forever home to, died this spring... Squirt the 4 mo. old died from a freak accident head trauma mere days before release... and now Imp too?

[HRT4SQRLS]

Yes, there are other symptoms. Pain, white tears, sniffly runny, wet nose and other vague respiratory problems. Blunt squared off incisors are common. They don't have the chiseled edge on the incisors. They stop chewing hard things like in shell nuts due to pain.

An odontoma is not a malignancy. It is a hard bony growth at the root of the incisors. The problem is that the accumulation of this hard dental material will invade the sinuses. As the sinus cavity is filled with the odontoma, they experience respiratory distress because squirrels aren't efficient mouth breathers. It can grow dangerously close to the brain. It causes pain, inflammation and infection. Some grow very slowly. Others grow rapidly.

There is only one treatment.... surgical removal. There are only a few veterinarians that do this surgery in the country. We are sorta biased in the south but the best surgeon for this is in FL. I believe there is a vet in the NE that is doing this procedure now.

Without an X-ray, this is just speculation. Odontoma are clearly visible on an X-ray.

There are many threads on TSB regarding odontoma. I think the case that is the best documented is Penny Cash's Resilie.

[HRT4SQRLS]

If Imp is dying or in such pain he needs to be euthanized, this will be the third squirrel we have lost this year... Juniper, the paralyzed squirrel that we gave a forever home to, died this spring... Squirt the 4 mo. old died from a freak accident head trauma mere days before release... and now Imp too?

I know you've had a rough year. :grouphug
Let's not get ahead of ourselves here. He needs to be diagnosed. I'm sure some of the NE members can link you up with a vet for an X-ray.

[niapet]

Yes if there is a surgeon that can do the surgery in the area we will do it. I was hoping that there is a vet in the greater Albany area, since Albany NY is surprisingly close and is a large city.

[niapet]

Quick Update:

Imp hasn't eaten any of the squirrel block I left with him this morning and has refused all offers of water since yesterday. I put a few pumpkin seeds and a grape tomato in the blanket with him and he ate everything. I put a few more tomatoes in there since at least they are a source of some liquid. The pumpkin seeds are also in the shell, so he had to open them. This makes me think the foot is the primary issue at the moment. I am sure the teeth are a problem but they are probably not the reason he is acting this way.

I should mention that whenever I disturb him he makes a high pitched buzzing sound. I am sure everyone is familiar with the lower pitched buzz squirrels make when they are warning you to stay away. This is a similar sound but higher pitched.. it may be a combination of warning and pain.. I'm not sure. Either way he makes it clear he is NOT happy about being handled. I can put my hand in there with him and pet his face and he relaxes, but any movement causes prompts him to make the sound again. This is probably because twice a day we do take him out to administer the Ibuprofen/Tramadol med.

[niapet]

We just gave Imp his nighttime pain med and he was more cooperative this time so I took the opportunity to examining his feet. I fear that his right ankle may be broken. It seemed to be at more of an angle then the left foot and definitely felt like it was swollen. I think he really needs a to see a vet.. this probably needs a cast or at least some type of brace, which I have no idea how I could get something like that on to him without sedation. I certainly do not have the expertise to know if the foot is set correctly or if there is an actual break or just a sprain or something.

Edit: I think i have my squirrel anatomy a little off. It may be the toes, or what would correspond to the ball of the foot on a human. It was not back where the bend is but more where they stand/the foot contacts the ground. I believe that would be broken toe bones possibly? This is odd because I broke three toes over the summer... I know the pain he is in if that is the case; I didn't go to a doctor either >.>

[HRT4SQRLS]

I'm hopeful that it's the toes and not the teeth. If you think Imp needs a vet, you should start a thread requesting information on squirrel friendly vets near you. I have seen splinted/casted legs on baby squirrels but I'm not sure what is recommended for adults.

[niapet]

Do you think this justifies a life threatening help needed thread or in this forum?

[HRT4SQRLS]

Do you think this justifies a life threatening help needed thread or in this forum?
I would put it here but I would start a new thread so that your request will be seen. Sometimes older threads will get overlooked. Putting 'vet needed' and a general area in the title is helpful.

[niapet]

Okay Ill make a new thread. I do have one other question, you may need to reply via PM since it involves meds. We are administering Tramadol and Ibuprofen for the pain. We have a few forms of prednisone available and there is clear swelling in his foot. Do you think it would help to add the steroid or would that be counterproductive for healing this type of injury?

Also, on the Tramadol Ibuprofen, I am administering a low"safe" dose. Do you know how well squirrels tolerate these drugs? Would it be safe to increase the dosage by 10% to help him a bit more with the pain (a PM with max safe dose mg/kg would be useful if you have that information)?