Hamster is sick and has a possible abscess/tumor. I need your advice and help.

Question

I have a Syrian Hamster who is around 5 months old. She has been sick for over a week now and we took her to the vet yesterday. Symtoms I provided was that she has been very lethargic (sleeping or staying in her bed for literally the whole day and night), she does leave the nest occasionally to get food and water. Her tail is not wet, she has sneezed occasionally over the past week. She does not have runny nose or watery eyes. Her stool is a little soft and she may have had some diarrhea.

The vet thought maybe she was pregnant when we had told her that she shares her cage with her sister as it is common for people to get the male/female mixed up. So she gave it an ultra sound and did not conclude to her being pregnant, but she said she did see an odd looking lump. She continued with a physical inspection and felt her for lumps and found a small lump by her arm and a larger one near her kidney. She said she wasn't sure if this was her kidney or not, but she has a strong feeling that our hamster does not have a typical cold, and it could be a tumor or abscess. She gave us the quote of what it would cost to assess the hamster further (with an xray for about $80, optional urine/stool samples, and blood work for around a $100) I have already paid for the visit, injection of anti-biotics, and oral take home anti-biotics in hopes that the problem is just a viral infection and nothing more. She told me if it doesn't work, I need to think about if I would like to take the option to assess her further. She also reminded me that even if we find out what the exact problem is, will I realistically attempt to treat it as the cost for a surgery will be over $200 and the hamsters chance of survival is very low because they are so small. It's understandable that most people would not treat it because of the slim chances of success and the cost for an animal that simply does not live long.

I've been at home for the past 24 hours thinking about this, watching my little baby and it has been totally killing me. A new symptom I noticed is that her body is pulsing very hard like she is having trouble breathing or her heart is beating really fast and working very hard. I compare her to the other hamster and the other one does not look like this at all. I'm going to call the doctor in the morning and tell her about the new symptom. I'm getting very scared for her and feel horrible inside having to watch her and know that this is just the beginning of her going down hill and things will only get worse for her.

I still don't know if she has a severe cold, a tumor, or an abssess, therefore, I'm not sure what to treat her with. I was wondering if anyone else has seen the same symptoms in their hamster, and if so, what the diagnosis was.

The dilemma I have is whether or not I should:

A. Get an x-ray done on my hamster to find out if it's a tumor or abssess. (If it's an abssess, see if it can be drained/removed)

B. Or not get an x-ray and keep treating her with the medicines for viral infections and common cold, and wait it out.

I know it's important that an abssess or tumor be treated as soon as possible as it will improve the chance of successul treatment. I thank you for your help and hope we can work together to get her better.

Answer 1

I am very sorry to hear about your little hamster. It is always hard to see our loved pets going through so much trouble. Having owned so many hamsters and currently having a brood of 7 hamsters, I can fully comprehend your problem and confusion.

I am going to be very frank in my advice, even if it sounds a bit hard. If a hamster has cancer or tumour, the success rate of surgery is very low. Also the surgery can be very traumatic to your hamster. Another thing - if it is an external abcess, it can be removed, but abcess internally are very difficult to remove. My opinion would be not to go in for surgery and give your hamster a great life for the rest of her life and if the tumour appears to cause the hamster pain, or grows so large that the hamster finds it difficult to move, it is kinder to let your vet put the hamster to sleep.

Of course the symptoms makes me think twice since sneezing and wheezing (where the body pulses very hard) are more obvious signs of a bad pneumonia than cancer. I would suggest you give her the medicines for common cold and wait it out to see if she gets better. The x-rays are not really helpful at this stage since even if she is detected with tumour, it does not help any further since an operation has very small degree of success in a hamster and more traumatic to the hamster than useful.

All the best!

Answer 2

Hi, i am very sorry about your darling hamster, i know you are going through a very hard time. Personally i think an x-ray is needed,it depends how you feel about it, by the sounds of it medicines probably won't help,i had a  hamster that developed these lumps things around his throat,it turned out it was just absess i got it clear and then he was fine. So i would say go for an x-ray,its better to get it done now when its not to late so if it something more serious you can hopefully get it sorted.

Best of Luck :) And hope this helped.