Toa Payoh Vets Clinical
Research Making veterinary surgery alive
to a veterinary student studying in Australia
using real case studies and pictures
Hamster
disease cases in Singapore
seen by Dr Sing at Toa Payoh Vets
Dr Sing Kong Yuen,
BVMS (Glasgow), MRCVS
Updated: Dec 11, 2009.
CASE 1 - A HAMSTER
WITH A CHEST ABSCESS/TUMOUR
Written in Dec 21,
2002
Updated: Sep 2, 2008
CASE 2 - HAMSTER WITH
ABSCESSES
Written in Dec 21, 2002
Updated: Sep 2, 2008
"The vet asked me to leave
my hamster at the surgery. When I went home, he
phoned and said it had died during surgery." Mrs
Chin recalled her previous experience with a
veterinarian. With a hamster death, she would not
return to the same veterinarian. This seems to be
a common practice of clients.
I had suggested the same procedure to her to leave
the hamster for surgery of a large skin swelling
of over 2 cm in diameter. A miniature
ping-pong ball dropped down the lower part of the
neck. This pinkish red swelling with no hair at
its base had grown tremendously over the last two
weeks stretching the skin to the limit. The soft
swelling was four times the head of the hamster
and would likely be a tumour or abscess.
Mrs Chin sad as a matter of fact, "My hamster
can't close his eyes anymore. He must be
sleeping with the eyes open." This hamster
had big prominent protruding eyeballs you could
not fail to miss. This poor hamster was
lifted up by the sheer size of this swelling as he
walked about the wood shavings.
I advised surgery as there was no other option to
treat this case. It could be a blood-type of
tumour. But it was most likely an abscess which
was a large collection of yellow dirty pus. The
body immune system could not cope with the
infectious bacteria and the pus kept being
produced daily.
"Your hamster is in a poor condition, being skinny
and dehydrated. He may die on the operating table
under anaesthesia" I explained. Hamsters are
usually operated on the spot, without the means to
check their health status by taking body
temperature and doing a blood test as in human or
dog medicine.
I was not keen on being the second vet whom Mrs
Chin who kept several hamsters, would say to her
friends that her hamster had died on the
operating table under Dr Sing.
It was a no win situation. If I did not operate,
the hamster would die painfully as he could not
eat or drink from the plate since the globular
swelling in his chest was much bigger than his
head size. This mass elevated him from the plate
level. He was not taught to drink from the
bottle nipple.
If I operated, the poor conditioned hamster has a
70% chance of dying which was not a good gamble on
my reputation.
So why not let the hamster live the last few weeks
of its natural life?
But, would this two-and-a-half years old hamster
survive longer since he had become emaciated and
distressed?
He was very uncomfortable and in pain daily. Being
unable to close his eyes even for a second. I
pressed his upper and lower eye lids together and
they would not close as the eyeballs were popping
out. That gave the impression he has such
beautiful big black eyes. He was suffering. Mrs
Chin ruled out any possibility of euthanasia to
prevent further pain. A humane solution.
The friction on the wood shavings had rubbed off
the hair on the base of this swelling making it as
shiny as an older man's balding head.
This dwarf hamster looked young but he had lost
weight as he had a tumour on his left nose too,
completely obstructing his left nostril. He could
breathe only through the right nostril. He would
have problem breathing normally. Given the
anaesthetic gas and would die of respiratory
failure. I would not even want to operate on a
hamster with such disadvantages. All owners and
veterinarians want a live hamster after
anaesthesia and surgery.
The veterinarian with a dead hamster on the
operating table would not be given a second chance
to perform surgery on another hamster of Mrs Chin.
The pale pink tumour with dark red bleeding spots
at one end of his nose had enlarged and elongated
to around 1 cm in length. At first sight, I
thought this was a new breed of dwarf hamster. A
piggy hamster because his nose was elongated and
looked like a pig snout.
"I can't decide now," Mrs Chin said. "The risk of
him dying is so great." This was one instance I
felt so relieved that I did not need to do surgery
as Mrs Chin went home with a hamster she loved a
lot.
Two days later, Mrs Chin decided on the operation
at eight o'clock on a Saturday morning. The
hamster had eaten overnight but had great
difficulty in swallowing.
I could not say no. Mr Chin, a serious looking and
thin man said, "Doc, please stitch up the operated
area of my hamster even if he died during
operation." He must have great love for this
little creature.
This was a tricky anaesthetic case as the hamster
could only breathe in through one normal nostril.
A risky one. How long should he be under the
anaesthetic gas?
Should I give him one minute of gas or should it
be double the time since he could only breathe in
through one nostril. The left nostril was crushed
by a big tumour.
I put him inside the gas container. He had great
difficulty in breathing as his chest expanded and
contracted vigorously unlike other hamsters.
Would his heart fail now?
If the anaesthetic gas was insufficient, he would
struggle and I would not be able to empty all the
dirty red brownish pus of the swollen chest.
The hamster was breathing hard, more like panting
and his heart beat was probably four hundred per
minute. The anaesthetic gas filtered into his
nostrils, past his throat and into the lungs in
this gasping hamster. Would he die of heart
failure?
In the dog and cat, I could use an endotracheal
tube which would be inserted into his mouth, into
the throat and then into the windpipe. Anaesthetic
gas would then be breathed in and I could control
the amount sufficient to knock him down without
killing him. Now, this direct breathing of gas
from the cotton wool was risky. Very risky. But
this hamster's heart was strong.
I used the scalpel to incise the skin. There was
another fibrous layer underneath. It seemed that
the body had walled off the dirty red abscess.
Sero-sanguineous or plainly, a thick dirty reddish
brown exudates oozed out from the wound.
I pressed the mass and
squeezed out 2 ml of pus. I extracted the stringy
mass of yellow tissue with my forceps after
emptying the sac. I pressed more to discharge
more pus.
The big lump just deflated like a pierced balloon
and a tough skin tissue enveloped the front of the
chest. I did not want to cut away the excess skin
and stitch up as this could be traumatic and kill
the hamster.
In any case, the hamster moved and used his hands
to grasp the forceps as I tied the second of two
absorbable stitch to close up the drainage
incision.
Veterinary books recommend not to stitch an
incised abscess as there would be more leftover
pus to drain out. This would be all right in
the bigger animal like the cat.
However, this hamster might
tear out the wound as the remnants of the pus
oozed out, licked away all toxic discharge. Being
so small, if he had licked just a few drops of the
toxins, he might die the next few days and this
would be upsetting to all.
I decided to stitching up the cut area of the
wound which was around 5mm long.
I used warm water to wash away the dirty blood. I
dried the wet body with tissue paper. Mrs Chin
would have to use tissue paper as bedding rather
than wood shavings. I gave it an antibiotic and
dextrose saline injection to kill the bacteria and
to rehydrate the hamster. The hamster would have
some antibiotics by mouth for the next three days.
He looked vigorous and was mobile within 5 minutes
at the end of anaesthesia. I checked his eye
reflex by touching his eye lids. At least he could
close his eyes now. I phoned Mrs Chin to
pick him up and nurse him at home.
Eleven hours after surgery, I phoned to find out
if the hamster was recovering well, fearing the
worst. It was better not to know.
This hamster was a survivor. Mr Chin said that the
hamster drank lots of water and was now eating.
Well, the dehydration must be severe.
"Doc, how about removing his nose tumour?" Mrs
Chin asked a few days later.
"No," I replied. "There
will be a big hole after surgery as I have no skin
on the nose to stitching up after cutting off the
tumour. The wound would be infected and the
hamster would then stop eating. If his nose became
too irritating, I would give him some
medication."
This was one operation that
I would not do as this hamster would not live long
with an infected and itchy open nose wound. There
are some surgeries which are best not done.
Besides he was nearing the end of his life span.
Hamsters live around 2.5 years and this chap would
not survive another anaesthesia and surgery. Let
him spend some time with his owners in his last
days. So I did not operate.
No veterinarian wants a dead hamster on the
operating table as deaths are very distressful
both to the owner and the veterinarian and his
staff.
The large skin
swelling of this over 2-year-old
hamster was similar in size and
softness to the one below the
chest of the dwarf hamster above.
The owner decided not to operate
as the anaesthetic risk was high. The hamster was still active
going up and down his ladder with
a big swelling behind. This may
or may not be an abscess. It may
be a hernia or haematoma.
BE KIND TO HAMSTERS Get your vet to remove
their tumours when they are small in size rather than
hope that these tumours will go away
BE KIND TO HAMSTERS
Do not permit your hamster's tumours
to grow so big that it becomes hard to
operate as there is insufficient skin
to stitch the wound after removal of
the tumour.
BE KIND TO HAMSTERS
Get abscesses operated by the
veterinarian before they expand
to huge balls.
CASE 3. A HAMSTER
WITH A LARGE FACIAL TUMOUR HANGING LOOSE
Written in Sep 2, 2008
How time flies since I
recorded the above two cases and took such poor
quality digital pictures.
6 years had passed by so quickly. More
Singaporeans keep hamsters but they are mostly
dwarf hamsters nowadays.
In 2008, a mother and daughter surfed the
internet. "There seems to be a case similar to
ours," the mother said. Their hamster had a
"similar" facial tumour and consulted me.
"But our hamster is only one year old," the mother
and daughter must have done their hamster tumour
research thoroughly. The younger the hamster, the
better the chance of survival on the operating
table.
Should the veterinarian operate or not? Will this
hamster survive the general anaesthesia?
Will the tumour recur?
The mother remarked, "Such a large tumour. There
must be a large blood vessel supplying nutrients
to it. To enable this tumour to grow so big!"
"Yes, " I said. You are correct." In this case,
the removal of the tumour is an easy job. The
problem is to stop the bleeding as the big blood
vessels feeding the tumour is cut. Unlike a dog, I
cannot see the large vessel, separate it and
ligate it before cutting off the tumour.
There is just a 3 mm stalk of this tumour
connecting it to the face. A small stalk with big
blood vessels supplying the tumour such that it
grows to be gigantic. A malignant tumour that
keeps growing. If this bleeding is not controlled,
the hamster's mouth and lower neck will be full of
bright red blood.
The hamster was put under general anaesthesia gas
for a few seconds. His big black eyes closed
sleepily. He was taken out of the gas container.
His tumour was snipped off at the base. Bright red
blood shot out as if a dam had burst.
I pressed cotton swabs onto this small wound of
around 3 mm after removal of the tumour. But the
blood would not stop flowing. The blood spilled
over the lower lips to the neck and shoulders.
What to do now? Obviously the owners can't
be expected to keep pressing the wound to stop the
bleeding. The hamster started to groom himself. To
wipe away the bleeding. To prevent me from doing
it. He was awake now and just would not tolerate
foreign interference.
A large grey
lump appears to grow fast above the right eye in
this Syrian Hamster, Male, 2 years old. What is
it? What is the cause?
Written in Jun 2009
Eyelid tumour/abscess is easily removed without
harming the hamster when they are small in size.
Electro-surgical excision used in this case. Be
careful.
Consult your vet when ear abscesses
are very small
TOA
PAYOH VETS
