Congestive heart failure (CHF) in gerbils
Sept 4, 2023 4:02:34 GMT -8
betty, Markpd, and 1 more like this
Post by LilyandDaisy on Sept 4, 2023 4:02:34 GMT -8
This is both an information thread and a kind of experience/anecdotal data seeking thread as heart failure in gerbils is a topic I keep encountering recently and I was curious to find out more. I also wanted to share what I have learnt about its symptoms and outlook.
General information
Congestive heart failure occurs when the heart muscle becomes progressively weakened or damaged so that it can no longer effectively pump blood. The failure of the heart to effectively move blood around the body results in fluid accumulating in areas such as the abdomen (ascites), lungs (pulmonary oedema) and legs or feet (peripheral oedema).
Heart failure is a syndrome (a set of related symptoms) rather than a distinct disease in itself. It may have various different causes.
In humans, there are two main classifications of heart failure: left-sided and right-sided (indicating which side of the heart is affected). Right-sided heart failure causes ascites, peripheral oedema and liver problems, while left-sided heart failure causes mainly respiratory symptoms (pulmonary oedema). In gerbils, it does appear that some gerbils have ascites and minimal other symptoms, whereas other gerbils are severely affected by respiratory issues, and this may correspond to a left-side/right-side classification as found in humans.
Signs and symptoms
The main symptoms of congestive heart failure seem to be:
- Bloating and weight gain due to a build up of fluid in the abdomen. Note that sometimes the number on the scale may not give a true picture of the gerbil's condition, as a gerbil can simultaneously gain fluid and lose fat/muscle mass, resulting in weight either staying the same or not changing very much, so it is important to assess your gerbil's body shape as well as their weight.
- Changes to breathing. It tends to be faster and the movement of the gerbil's flanks with each breath tends to be more noticeable than it would be in a healthy gerbil. You may also notice a gerbil's head bobbing with each breath which indicates increased breathing effort. This video shows the breathing of a gerbil with congestive heart failure and pulmonary oedema.
- General tiredness and reduced activity, which may come and go or fluctuate. Affected gerbils may still have bursts of normal activity, especially in the earlier stages of the condition, but may be more easily fatigued. In the earlier stages of heart failure you might not notice any behavioural changes at all.
- Sometimes you might notice a gerbil sleeping with their head or upper body propped up. This is due to orthopnoea, shortness of breath that occurs when lying flat and is a sign of pulmonary oedema. This sign should be taken as an indication that your gerbil's quality of life is declining.
- "Wet" noises or other sounds may be heard with each breath, if there is pulmonary oedema. This might lead to an incorrect presumptive diagnosis of respiratory infection.
- Sometimes there might be porphyrin around one or both eyes.
- Occasionally, a gerbil's gums or genital area might turn blue or grey. This indicates they are in acute respiratory distress and should see a vet immediately.
- Another sign of acute respiratory distress is a gerbil breathing with their mouth open or opening the mouth with each breath. Gerbils are obligate nasal breathers which means they always breathe through their noses except when they can't get enough oxygen that way, for example if the nose is blocked. In the context of heart failure, mouth breathing means the gerbil is severely struggling to get enough oxygen and if therefore trying to take in as much air as possible with every breath. Mouth breathing means a gerbil is suffering acutely and immediate veterinary help should be sought.
Cause
I have no idea what might cause heart failure in gerbils. A genetic component seems likely. Female gerbils seem to have some factor that makes them especially prone to it, especially after 2 years of age.
In humans, causes are many and include heart attacks, prolonged high blood pressure, viral infections, heart rhythm disorders, genetic or autoimmune cardiomyopathies, exposure to toxins, kidney disease, chronic severe anaemia, starvation and nutrient deficiencies. It is hard to say whether any of these causes could apply to heart failure in gerbils.
Treatment
If treatment is sought, the mainstay would be diuretics to control the build up of fluid in the abdomen and lungs. Personally, I am skeptical of how much this actually extends the gerbil's lifespan and/or improves their quality of life. Diuretics don't help the heart function better, they only help a bit with the symptoms. They can cause kidney issues in the long term and in the short term may have a significant impact of quality of life as the liquid dose is fairly large and the constant need to pee may be exhausting for an already unwell gerbil.
There do exist medications that aim to improve heart function. You can read about some of these here. I haven't ever heard of these being used in a gerbil, but this is a route to potentially explore if you have a thoughtful/engaged (ideally exotic) vet.
When a gerbil has any kind of breathing issue, especially if there are respiratory noises involved, vets will often want to try antibiotics for a week or two just in case it's a respiratory infection. Many vets also are not confident using diuretic treatment in rodents and would much prefer to treat it as a simple respiratory infection rather than looking into other causes. However if your gerbil does have heart failure with respiratory symptoms, there really is no time to spare, not even a week or two to see if antibiotics help. If treatment is a path you want to go down, it needs to start as soon as possible. A gerbil with a genuine respiratory infection will tend to have the characteristic "sick gerbil" appearance: puffy, hunched, lethargic, and shouldn't have abdominal bloating unless there's another underlying condition. By contrast, gerbils with heart failure will typically be bloated and are less likely to have the "sick gerbil" appearance as they try to carry on as normal as much as possible, although this tends to belie the true extent to which they are suffering.
Prognosis
This seems to depend on what type of heart failure a gerbil has. Some gerbils appear to only have ascites and no pulmonary oedema, and although I have no personal experience with this type of heart failure, anecdotally these gerbils often seem to live for some time with minimal symptoms.
However, when there is pulmonary oedema, the picture is radically different. Heart failure with pulmonary oedema tends to worsen very rapidly (over the course of days or a couple of weeks at most) and causes significant suffering to the gerbil. Euthanasia is usually necessary to prevent a very distressing death from pulmonary oedema, which involves a gerbil essentially drowning in their own fluids.
Questions/Discussion
Here are just a few questions if anyone is able to give any information, or even just thoughts or speculation.
1. If you have had a gerbil with heart failure, what kind of symptoms did they have, and how did the condition progress? Did you try treatment, and how did that go? I'd like to gather as much information as possible.
2. Has anyone here ever had a male gerbil with heart failure? Every gerbil I have encountered with heart failure has been female, and I believe those I have read about online have always been female as well.
3. If heart failure is indeed more common in female gerbils, what biological factors could cause this?
General information
Congestive heart failure occurs when the heart muscle becomes progressively weakened or damaged so that it can no longer effectively pump blood. The failure of the heart to effectively move blood around the body results in fluid accumulating in areas such as the abdomen (ascites), lungs (pulmonary oedema) and legs or feet (peripheral oedema).
Heart failure is a syndrome (a set of related symptoms) rather than a distinct disease in itself. It may have various different causes.
In humans, there are two main classifications of heart failure: left-sided and right-sided (indicating which side of the heart is affected). Right-sided heart failure causes ascites, peripheral oedema and liver problems, while left-sided heart failure causes mainly respiratory symptoms (pulmonary oedema). In gerbils, it does appear that some gerbils have ascites and minimal other symptoms, whereas other gerbils are severely affected by respiratory issues, and this may correspond to a left-side/right-side classification as found in humans.
Signs and symptoms
The main symptoms of congestive heart failure seem to be:
- Bloating and weight gain due to a build up of fluid in the abdomen. Note that sometimes the number on the scale may not give a true picture of the gerbil's condition, as a gerbil can simultaneously gain fluid and lose fat/muscle mass, resulting in weight either staying the same or not changing very much, so it is important to assess your gerbil's body shape as well as their weight.
- Changes to breathing. It tends to be faster and the movement of the gerbil's flanks with each breath tends to be more noticeable than it would be in a healthy gerbil. You may also notice a gerbil's head bobbing with each breath which indicates increased breathing effort. This video shows the breathing of a gerbil with congestive heart failure and pulmonary oedema.
- General tiredness and reduced activity, which may come and go or fluctuate. Affected gerbils may still have bursts of normal activity, especially in the earlier stages of the condition, but may be more easily fatigued. In the earlier stages of heart failure you might not notice any behavioural changes at all.
- Sometimes you might notice a gerbil sleeping with their head or upper body propped up. This is due to orthopnoea, shortness of breath that occurs when lying flat and is a sign of pulmonary oedema. This sign should be taken as an indication that your gerbil's quality of life is declining.
- "Wet" noises or other sounds may be heard with each breath, if there is pulmonary oedema. This might lead to an incorrect presumptive diagnosis of respiratory infection.
- Sometimes there might be porphyrin around one or both eyes.
- Occasionally, a gerbil's gums or genital area might turn blue or grey. This indicates they are in acute respiratory distress and should see a vet immediately.
- Another sign of acute respiratory distress is a gerbil breathing with their mouth open or opening the mouth with each breath. Gerbils are obligate nasal breathers which means they always breathe through their noses except when they can't get enough oxygen that way, for example if the nose is blocked. In the context of heart failure, mouth breathing means the gerbil is severely struggling to get enough oxygen and if therefore trying to take in as much air as possible with every breath. Mouth breathing means a gerbil is suffering acutely and immediate veterinary help should be sought.
Cause
I have no idea what might cause heart failure in gerbils. A genetic component seems likely. Female gerbils seem to have some factor that makes them especially prone to it, especially after 2 years of age.
In humans, causes are many and include heart attacks, prolonged high blood pressure, viral infections, heart rhythm disorders, genetic or autoimmune cardiomyopathies, exposure to toxins, kidney disease, chronic severe anaemia, starvation and nutrient deficiencies. It is hard to say whether any of these causes could apply to heart failure in gerbils.
Treatment
If treatment is sought, the mainstay would be diuretics to control the build up of fluid in the abdomen and lungs. Personally, I am skeptical of how much this actually extends the gerbil's lifespan and/or improves their quality of life. Diuretics don't help the heart function better, they only help a bit with the symptoms. They can cause kidney issues in the long term and in the short term may have a significant impact of quality of life as the liquid dose is fairly large and the constant need to pee may be exhausting for an already unwell gerbil.
There do exist medications that aim to improve heart function. You can read about some of these here. I haven't ever heard of these being used in a gerbil, but this is a route to potentially explore if you have a thoughtful/engaged (ideally exotic) vet.
When a gerbil has any kind of breathing issue, especially if there are respiratory noises involved, vets will often want to try antibiotics for a week or two just in case it's a respiratory infection. Many vets also are not confident using diuretic treatment in rodents and would much prefer to treat it as a simple respiratory infection rather than looking into other causes. However if your gerbil does have heart failure with respiratory symptoms, there really is no time to spare, not even a week or two to see if antibiotics help. If treatment is a path you want to go down, it needs to start as soon as possible. A gerbil with a genuine respiratory infection will tend to have the characteristic "sick gerbil" appearance: puffy, hunched, lethargic, and shouldn't have abdominal bloating unless there's another underlying condition. By contrast, gerbils with heart failure will typically be bloated and are less likely to have the "sick gerbil" appearance as they try to carry on as normal as much as possible, although this tends to belie the true extent to which they are suffering.
Prognosis
This seems to depend on what type of heart failure a gerbil has. Some gerbils appear to only have ascites and no pulmonary oedema, and although I have no personal experience with this type of heart failure, anecdotally these gerbils often seem to live for some time with minimal symptoms.
However, when there is pulmonary oedema, the picture is radically different. Heart failure with pulmonary oedema tends to worsen very rapidly (over the course of days or a couple of weeks at most) and causes significant suffering to the gerbil. Euthanasia is usually necessary to prevent a very distressing death from pulmonary oedema, which involves a gerbil essentially drowning in their own fluids.
Questions/Discussion
Here are just a few questions if anyone is able to give any information, or even just thoughts or speculation.
1. If you have had a gerbil with heart failure, what kind of symptoms did they have, and how did the condition progress? Did you try treatment, and how did that go? I'd like to gather as much information as possible.
2. Has anyone here ever had a male gerbil with heart failure? Every gerbil I have encountered with heart failure has been female, and I believe those I have read about online have always been female as well.
3. If heart failure is indeed more common in female gerbils, what biological factors could cause this?
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