guinea pig with ringworm

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Sammy82 — Wed, 01 Apr 2015 10:24:40 GMT

I remember being taught that Trichophyton can linger for many years in cattle sheds. I imagine though that a pet shop set up should be easier to desinfect. I would advise to dispose of all wooden acessories, ropes or fabrics.

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Marie Kubiak — Wed, 01 Apr 2015 08:44:20 GMT

[quote user="Michael Woodhouse"]My conclusion was you can reduce it, but never eliminate from housing. Especially if wooden or permanent construction.[/quote]

Or the new cattle came in with it?

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Michael Woodhouse — Wed, 01 Apr 2015 01:27:00 GMT

Our receptionist is a farmer's wife. They cows were killed out with foot and mouth. The buildings remained empty for 9 months after thorough cleansing and disinfection to DEFRA standards. To reintroduce animals you brought a small number of 'sentinels' onto the farm. In a building that had been cleaner than the day it was erected the cattle went down with ringworm in a few weeks.

My conclusion was you can reduce it, but never eliminate from housing. Especially if wooden or permanent construction.

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Marie Kubiak — Tue, 31 Mar 2015 21:39:54 GMT

Enilconzaole or bleach (up to 1:100 dilution for both) are effective for Trichophyton.

Marie

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Helen Redfern — Tue, 31 Mar 2015 17:01:29 GMT

Thank you, what is best for housing disinfection- imaverol? Many thanks

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Marie Kubiak — Tue, 31 Mar 2015 16:24:31 GMT

[quote user="Helen Redfern"]

Suspected ringworm in guinea pigs:

We have a local pet shop that presents guinea pigs with skin lesions very frequently. Due to financial considerations the guinea pigs have never had cultures done for ringworm and they have been treated with itrafungol which my colleague has been using for 14 consecutive days as they found previously that the lesions recurred when using the 7d on/7d off protocol. Quite often the lesions are over the nasal/ supra ocular region and I have seen the posts regarding the use of mycozole spray and imaverol baths but was concerned using these products over these regions. In addition I have never used imaverol baths in guinea pigs and was uncertain as to the protocol and how to instigate environmental control.

Any help greatly appreciated.

[/quote]

I would be pretty tough on the pet shop - if they are selling an animal as a child's pet with a likely zoonotic disease that they are declining to investigate then they are behaving irresponsibly. If repeated groups of new animals are getting infected then they need to thoroughly clean and disinfect all the housing and get on top of the problem, or avoid getting in new animals until they have things under control and look at how they can minimise stress to the animals under their care. If animals come in with problems then they need to change their supplier.

Marie

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Rebecca Marchewka — Mon, 30 Mar 2015 17:45:31 GMT

I thought that ring worm in young guinea pigs was self limiting and that they 'grew out of it' - is that wrong?

I used to see a lot from a local pet shop and used various treatments. At one point it turned out that they had been using sudocreme instead of what I had advised and the G pigs seemed to do just as well.

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Helen Redfern — Mon, 30 Mar 2015 16:08:42 GMT

Suspected ringworm in guinea pigs:

Any help greatly appreciated.

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Glenn Hodgson — Thu, 09 Oct 2014 13:55:01 GMT

I always thought that imaverol baths were the way to go?

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Glenn Hodgson — Thu, 09 Oct 2014 13:54:38 GMT

I always thought that imaverol baths were the way to go?

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

emma_j — Thu, 09 Oct 2014 10:21:58 GMT

Bit confusing Robin, your original post was asking for advice on treatment for ringworm, but then you say you don't see the need to treat the case.

As an aside I personally would not go near guinea-pigs with steroid injections, you're far braver than me! At initial presentation, if no mites on scrape and hair depilates easily, I'd be considering dermatophytosis as most likely differential and like Marie would be going with Mycozole as standard treatment, and treating in-contact pigs too.

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Robin Grimmer — Mon, 06 Oct 2014 23:05:18 GMT

Perhaps I didn't make it very clear. The GP had pruritic skin lesions that failed to respond to topical Xeno prescribed by my colleague. I then saw the GP, took a sample for fungal culture and started it on injectable ivomec/cortisone. It took a while to get the fungal culture results. By that time the skin had completely cleared up.

I heard somewhere about a synergistic effect between ringworm and mange. So maybe treating the mange has led to spontaneous resolution of the ringworm also. Anyway, the skin has completely resolved, the other GP who lives with this one is not affected so can't see why I need to treat it for ringworm.

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Martin Atkinson — Mon, 06 Oct 2014 19:44:07 GMT

[quote user="Robin Grimmer"]

I saw this guinea pig on Friday and it has responded very well to injectable ivermectin and cortisone, didn't seem to respond to xeno. The other gp is fine, the owners don't have any lesions so I'm not going to treat the ringworm, will just monitor.

[/quote]I'm confused: you said in the OP that you've diagnosed Trichophyton in this pig - why would you not treat it accordingly? All you've done is treat a possible concurrent mite infestation and reduced the itch. Ivermectin didn't treat fungal infections last time I looked.

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

tess — Mon, 06 Oct 2014 18:23:24 GMT

You can use Imaverol too. Important to treat the hutch as well.

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Robin Grimmer — Sun, 05 Oct 2014 09:02:39 GMT

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Marie Kubiak — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 20:02:53 GMT

Mycozole spray is easy to apply and is tolerated well without the potential adverse effects of systemic azoles. If you need to use Itraconazole systemically you are safer doing one week on, one week off (like recommended in cats I think?) than continuous treatment.

Marie

Re: guinea pig with ringworm

Martin Atkinson — Tue, 30 Sep 2014 15:19:59 GMT

Itrafungol 5mg/kg q 24 hrs until cultures clear.