[Gpdd] (Health) Elderly Piggies

[Stacy Harvey]

My Maxine is 7 1/2+ years old, so I guess that makes her geriatric. We don't know how old she is for sure as we got her from a friend, but I can say that she has outlived all my other pigs that were around when she came to live with us. 
 
Maxine is a red color, but her "muzzle" is now peppered with white. She seems to see okay (no cataracts) and her hearing is good although she produces a lot of ear wax. The biggest problem that I have with her is she doesn't move around a lot so we are constantly battling urine scald and UTIs (she gets around fine, just a little slower than in her youth.) She does bunny hop occasionally (x-rays show some arthritis in the hips), and on those days I give her a few drops of Metacam. She does some "hooting" when she breathes and I usually hear it in the morning. Some days she has it, others she doesn't. Her appetite is good. Her "wheeker" is also broken--she can wheek but it sounds like a whisper and she used to be a very vocal pig. She also has ovarian cysts that make her abdomen look rather large, but they aren't causing her any problems right now.
 
There is something that older piggies have been known to get called "wasting disease". Even though they eat well they continue to lose weight. That happend to my Max who passed a few years ago; it started with problems with his teeth and just got progressively worse. We don't know if the teeth problems caused this "wasting" or if they were a result of  it. He was about 5 1/2 years old when I had to help him across the Bridge.
 
There is some anecdotal evidence that the wasting may be hyperthyroidism, which my little Tigger is experiencing now. There is hardly any information out there about it, which is very frustrating when you have a sick piggy.
 
We hope your little Angela is doing well.
 
-Stacy and the Squee Squad