Well, I don't know what just happened....

[Scott]

I'd noticed that one of my gerbils--a little under 3--had been a listless and had lost weight. I called the small animal vet Saturday afternoon, but literally 1 minute after they closed and the phone went to voicemail. I called a couple of those 24 hour veterinary clinics, and they said they didn't have a small animal docs that weekend. So I called the exotic animal vet Monday morning and they got me in for the afternoon.

By this point he seemed in a bad way. The vet examined him and found he had a broken incisor and that the other had grown in crooked and into his cheek. She trimmed, injected an antibiotic and an anti-inflammatory and sent me home with gabapentin. She noted that he had been dehydrated and expressed concern about the effects this might have had on him.

I gave him the meds and fed him critical care. By the next morning he was taking it on his own--I put it on my finger and he ate. Over the next couple of days his appetite increased; I had to keep mixing up more and more, plus I gave him some grapes to make sure he didn't get dehydrated again. He was in a separate cage that I kept near a heater, since it's winter here.

Everything seemed on the mend; yesterday I set up a split cage and put him back with his brother. By this time he wasn't eating quite as well. Part of it I chalked up to a change in diet--when I bought Critical Care a while back (earlier surgery) I had unthinkingly bought CC-Herbivore. It was only this week I realized gerbils needed CC-Omnivore. It was on order and arrived Friday, but he seemed to hate it and wouldn't eat any.

I'd had him in a separate cage (recommendation by the vet) but I did a split cage with his brother and put him back into that tank.

But this morning he looked awful. Breathing was labored and I could hear clicking. I brought him back to the vet at noon. She put in in an O2 tent, and said there was some nasal discharge, it could be he'd aspirated some food and had an upper respiratory infection. Or it could be his heart. 

She gave him doxycycline and some IV fluid therapy and sent him home with me (they're not open tomorrow to have kept him).

We got home and I went to put him back and he was dead.

Suffice to say I'm a little stunned. Could this have been a reaction to anything the vet did? Or is it pure coincidence?

[TJ's Rodent Ranch]

I'm really sorry to hear about this. I hope you're doing okay.

I have a theroy as to what might have happened, but I can't be sure.
If he was very dehydrated, there could have been organ damage, which may have been hardest on his kidneys. If his kidneys were failing, then it's possible that they couldn't process the waste of his body, which built up and damaged his other organs- mainly his heart. The heart would then become congested, meaning that there was too much pressure on the heart from fluid build-up. If this were the case, the IV fluid therapy was probably the last straw, since it would have added more fluid to the pressure onto the heart, and then the heart would give out. It could have been what happened, and why he died before you got home.
I'm not sure what to think of the incisor. As far as I understand, it's unlikely that it's related, and it was probably just a very unlucky coincidence.

I'm not a vet, this is just how it might affect the human body, but I'm not sure about a gerbil. There's probably someone on here that might be able to provide a more conclusive answer.

[Scott]

Yes, I'd wondered whether the kidneys might be an issue; I was surprised the vet didn't mention that since she's the one who'd mentioned the issue initially.
The incisor-connection was that was probably not getting liquids (from food or the water bottle) for an unknown number of days due to his dental problems, causing the dehydration. When I brought him to the vet his weight had dropped to 65g.

[Markpd]

I've no idea tbh, just wanted to say sorry about the sudden loss of your old boy