3 Hours at the Vet

Today we had an appointment for Virga and Cirrus for their annual wellness check.  They are now almost nine years old.  We also had another reason for taking them to the vet. She and Cirrus have had a brown discharge around their pouch, and it seems to have been bothering Virga some.  She will frequently spend several minutes grooming and cleaning her pouch. We had taken her in for this before, and the vet indicated it was the result of glandular discharge related to hormonal activity and was fairly common and not usually a problem. So, we were expecting much the same result today.  Cirrus, always curious about what is going on around her, was active and awake once we got into the exam room, so she was first up for her checkup.  She is doing great and weighed in at 79 grams.

Virga was sleeping comfortably in the pouch when I had to scoop her out for her exam. Both she and Cirrus did pretty well with Dr. Whitington, squirming as they usually do but overall being well-behaved all things considered.  As part of their exam the vet took a swab from their pouch to check for anything unusual.  When Dr. Whitington took the swab from Virga, we were all surprised to see blood on the swab. She was a little concerned about it, but indicated that the blood was likely the result of the swabbing but also said there was some irritation. As she continued the examination, she found two masses near the middle and side of the pouch. Dr. Whitington indicted they seemed to be mammary in origin and wanted to examine Virga's pouch and the masses more closely. This would require general anesthesia and about an hour to complete, including lab analysis.  We told her to go ahead and headed out to wait with a very unhappy Cirrus.  She did not want to be in the bonding pouch, especially by herself. For most of the hour she kept trying to push through the mesh, to the point her normally pink nose was red.

About an hour and 15 minutes later Dr. Whitington brought a now awake Virga out to us and filled us in on what she found. Virga's pouch was irritated and inflamed, and she could see one mass through the pouch. The other wasn't easy to see. Dr. Whitington suspects the inflammation and masses may be due to mastitis.  Virga is on an antibiotic (Trimethoprim-sulfa) and an anti-inflammatory (Metacam) for 14 days, and then she goes in to be checked. If the medication doesn't help, then the next step will be to do a biopsy and go from there.

Needless to say, we were pretty bummed out by the news.  In hindsight we could note some small changes in her behavior.  She is normally the first out of the pouch when it's yogurt or mealworm time, and lately she has been slower to come out.  However her appetite has been good, her weight has been stable, and she has been active (spends a lot of time on the wheel). On a positive note, the vet said that Virga is in otherwise great shape.

Virga came though the whole exam very well and curled up to sleep in the bonding pouch once she was brought out. Cirrus was pretty stressed out the whole time, but finally relaxed on the way home.  She is spending most of play time tonight napping in a fleece blanket.