Heart disease in an older hamster...

[BCjetta]

Just curious if anyone has ever had a hamster diagnosed with or treated for Heart Disease/Failure? There is not a ton of literature on it that I have found.
Its more common in middle aged to older females and depending on if its left or right sided they can get fluid build up in their chest or abdomen. If its in the chest, they will get laboured breathing, if its in the abdomen, it will get bloated.

I believe my oldest female has heart disease. Its difficult to listen to a hamster heart with a dog sized stethoscope but we had 3 of us listening to it and all agreed it wasn't a nice normal beat, there was definitely an arrhythmia. Our x-ray machine isn't great on real small things but it appears she has congestion in her lungs which would be making her have the laboured breathing.
I got a compounding pharmacy to make up 2 drugs we use for heart failure in a berry flavoured liquid and have been giving her that. So far there are no obvious changes, either better or worse.
She still eats and drinks but does not run on the wheel and is generally inactive.

[de4life]

I had a male Syrian who died from suspected heart disease about a year ago, he was around 2 years 8 months when he passed.

Obvious signs are rapid breathing, lethargy, dizziness, and the hamster feeling cool to the touch. When the heart begins to malfunction it takes a lot out of a Syrian, but they can survive for remarkably long. I would say Hjalmar survived about 3 months after serious symptoms appeared. Watching him deteriorate was really tough, but right up until the end he was absolutely determined to continue as normally as possible.

In terms of medicine, there is not really anything you can do for the hamster at this point if she has heart failure. Just make it as easy as possible for her to get to her food, water, etc, and try to keep her warm.

[Vectis Hamstery]

I had a female syrian with heart failure - she had fast breathing, audible fluid on her lungs and her paws/nose turned blue on exercise then she would collapse. I downsized her to a smaller cage and removed her wheel. My vet suggested three says of daily subcutaneous furosemide injections and if she improved we'd treat her orally (if not, she'd be put to sleep). She responded well and was converted to oral furosemide and benazapril (Fortekor). She lived a number of weeks on this, until she needed putting to sleep when her quality of life deteriorated and she gave me 'the look'. She'd been the first hamster spayed at my vets and they were sorry to see her go too. A very special girl was Bella.