Respiratory Infection update.

I decided to start a new thread update from this post:
http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...pdate-Bad-news

Some good news i took Meaty "my normal" into the vets yesterday for a culture to figure out exactly what is going on. Not the cheapest procedure $165 for a culture and sensitivity test plus vet fees $45 but hopefully this will solve everything and get my animals on the correct medication.

I initially was going to culture honey "my lesser" also because she has a different strand of reparatory infection or pneumonia but my vet told me she didn't have enough saliva in her mouth to get an accurate culture. Does this sound right to you? She is clearing up though but still has slight congestion in her chest but doing much better than two weeks ago. Should i just wait to see if the congestion gets better/worse before i go ahead with the culture or should i head back to the vet to get the culture asap? In your experience how long after being off treatments does the congestion clear up?

Time will tell i guess and i hope everything is solved within the next month I will let you know what the vet prescribes next.

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Originally Posted by oskyle1567

I decided to start a new thread update from this post:
http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...pdate-Bad-news

Some good news i took Meaty "my normal" into the vets yesterday for a culture to figure out exactly what is going on. Not the cheapest procedure $165 for a culture and sensitivity test plus vet fees $45 but hopefully this will solve everything and get my animals on the correct medication.

I initially was going to culture honey "my lesser" also because she has a different strand of reparatory infection or pneumonia but my vet told me she didn't have enough saliva in her mouth to get an accurate culture. Does this sound right to you? She is clearing up though but still has slight congestion in her chest but doing much better than two weeks ago. Should i just wait to see if the congestion gets better/worse before i go ahead with the culture or should i head back to the vet to get the culture asap? In your experience how long after being off treatments does the congestion clear up?

Time will tell i guess and i hope everything is solved within the next month I will let you know what the vet prescribes next.

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They charged you $165 for a swab + culture or $165 for a tracheal wash + culture?

I have a sinking feeling that due to her "saliva" comment, she charged you $165 to put a q-tip in your snakes mouth...........

Well the $165 is the fee for the lab tests and diagnosis she charged $45 to stick the swab down the trachea. I did mention a lung wash and she said the swab method puts allot less stress and is more safe for the snake. Given the effects of the anesthetics and the decreased capacity of the lungs from the RI i guess it could cause the snake to stop breathing. As for the lesser not having enough saliva it was really up to me but she said the results would not be as effective and leaded me away from it.

Did they put a swab in the mouth of the snake or one down the trachea?

She put it down the trachea. The snake kept holding her breath before she put the swab in i was amazed on how long they could hold there breath!

If the female has an infection, the bacteria will be in the trachea regardless of saliva contents. Perhaps your vet meant there wasn't enough saliva (as a symptom) to warrant treatment? If the infection is mild enough some vets recommend waiting to see if it will clear up on its own.

Your probably right Crazy4Herps it is an expensive procedure so its probably best to just wait to see if she relapse. The culture only takes 3 days to test.

The culture came in on sat. and the my vet and the owner of the practice are "looking into it" im more than frustrated... The only information they have gave me thus far is its immune to all the standard meds ie amikacin baytril fortaz I remember vibramycin being mentioned in our conversation but im not sure.. Can i take my results to another vet beause this is ridiculous i shouldn't have to wait more than a couple days for them to give me an outcome. Its tough watching these guys deteriorate like this and not being able to do anything about it..

I got a call back from my vet "few" and there working with there distributor to try and find the medicine i need. I guess the drugs there looking at aren't very common and can be expensive. So i just need to hang tight but i feel allot better that they have contacted me and are working on it.

Once upon a time I grabbed a lesser from a fellow locally.

It had a RI and I didn't mind, took it home and put it on baytril for 2 weeks to no avail. I took it to have a culture and it came back resistant to all the standard drugs, including baytril and fortaz. The snake died.

Although it has been spoken about here and there, I am convinced that there is a strain of RI, be it viral or bacterial that is resistant to our current medications. There are so many people who use baytril for only half a course of treatment, then sell a snake, that I question if we haven't already produced some kind of "super" bug.

Is your snake at least on something in the meantime while you're waiting for results? Have you tried F10 to nebulize?

ricky, viral respiratory infections cannot be treated at all, presently. Antibiotics are only effective on bacterial infections. So, if a snake picks up a virus, it's pretty much on its own--you can provide supportive care with heat and nebulizing to help thin mucous secretions, but that's all. Antibiotics may be used to help prevent a secondary bacterial infection from occurring afterward.

Most of the viral snake respiratory infections I am aware of have a high mortality rate. This is why quarantine is so important, and why folks should lengthen quarantine periods to 1 year. Some viral infections can incubate for up to 10 months, and viruses tend to be a great deal more contagious than bacterial infections.

Honestly, biosecurity is much too lax in the general reptile community, and as a result, these illnesses are proliferating. Think of this--if a person receives an infected snake, quarantines it for 3 months, then introduces it to their collection, tries to breed it, then sells the animals that came into contact with it (or its mate), and then 6 months later sells the animal, it's gone, the infected animals are gone, and they never see a problem...and the buyers wind up with these infected animals that develop symptoms later. The first person then winds up with some random snake in their collection getting infected, but they have absolutely no idea how it happened (transfer from one of the infected bins). In the mean time, the second animals to be infected have all had the chance to infect additional animals, because 3 months is simply not a long enough quarantine period to prevent it.

I know of a lot of people who don't even do that much. I wince every time I hear "He's already locking up with my females' right after someone receives an animal. I think it's an increasing problem, and there should be a lot more awareness if we're going to bring these diseases under control. There's no reason why captive snakes should be carrying these illnesses, they're not coming in from contact with wild animals. I've heard so many stories by this point that I'm afraid every time I bring a new animal in, even though I quarantine for a year.

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Originally Posted by WingedWolfPsion

ricky, viral respiratory infections cannot be treated at all, presently. Antibiotics are only effective on bacterial infections. So, if a snake picks up a virus, it's pretty much on its own--you can provide supportive care with heat and nebulizing to help thin mucous secretions, but that's all. Antibiotics may be used to help prevent a secondary bacterial infection from occurring afterward.

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Good to know. Then perhaps that snake had a viral RI.

Something I've been curious of lately, are viral RI's air-born? I have heard of people who consider a quarantine to simply be a snake in its own tub without touching other snakes. But, if RIs can become air-born then bringing a virally infected snake into the same room (even if it's in a different tub) will then infect all the snakes.

So - what do you believe is a good quarantine practice for those folks who don't have a separate room all together?

Was searching through my old threads and realized there were some posts i didnt respond to. thanks for chiming in Ricky and WingedWolfPsion. Lately i have been trying to keep my hopes up for the two who will hopefully pull though my lesser and spinner and Its going to take time to get over the ones i have lost.

I do have good news they are both live and well the spinner is recovering and hasent had any heavy signs for a good 3 months now. The lesser still has a "rasp" deep in her lounge but has been doing better than she has ever been. Things are looking up and i hope next time i tune in i can say they have beet this thing 100% going to give them a good year in quarenteen to be safe.