The Importance of Selecting an Experience Reptile Vet

Three weeks ago I got a call from a person who I sold a trio of children’s pythons to seven years ago.

Apparently, one of the males died displaying all of the tell-tale signs of IBD – you know, corkscrewing, regurgitation, etc.

The owner was in a panic, demanding his money back, wringing his hands about the threat to the rest of his collection etc.

After talking to him for about 30 minutes, I got the entire scoop. The timeline goes like this:

• 6 weeks before the animal died, it regurged a medium sized rat.

• 5 weeks before the animal died, it regurged a small rat.

• 4 weeks before the animal died, it regurged a small rat.

• 3 weeks before the animal died, it began refusing meals. It also began having issues with “musking” for a lack of a better word.

• 1 week before the animal died it contracted a respiratory infection.

• 1 week before the animal died the owner took it to a vet who noted the respiratory infection, the onset of septicemia and odd posturing.

• The vet, without taking any tests, declared that the animal had IBD and recommended euthanasia.

• Two days before the animal died, it began doing death rolls and thrashing, sub-marining and other signs of neurological damage.

We were lucky enough that not only did the owner live relatively close by, but that he refrigerated the carcass. I offered to assist him in paying for a necropsy with the understanding that if it was IBD we’d discuss testing the rest of his collection.

The body was handed over to my vet along with the feeding/poop/shed history.

We got the final results back yesterday and I thought that some people might find them both interesting and instructive.

The snake died of gastritis that was brought on from multiple regurges. The owner had a leftover medium size rat that a woma python refused so he fed it to his “garbage” disposal – the children’s python. The size and weight of the rat was way too much for the snake who threw it up after 3 days. A week later he attempted another feed which was followed by another vomiting and then a third feeding close on the heels of that.

Three regurge/vomiting episodes in less than three weeks led to the gastritis which initially manifested itself in a loss of appetite. At this point, the animal was critically sick and its immune system was down. It contracted a respiratory infection and it is probable that the onset of septicemia occurred just prior to the URI.

The stomach of the snake was full of cheesy discharge and was in overall tatters. The necropsy/histology also noted large widespread infection of the entire digestive system which had spread into the lung and the liver.

No inclusion bodies were found and the cause of death was wholly attributed to gastritis.

What I found interested and the main reason why I am sharing this is that I truly feel that if this incident had been reported on the forums, people would have been shouting IBD from the rooftops. The fact is that this is a simple case of a person offering an inappropriately sized meal to an animal, having a regurge and then not properly allowing or assisting the rehabilitation of the digestive system. If the owner had not refrigerated the animal, I am certain we would be testing his entire collection for IBD.

When my vet called the vet who made the initial IBD diagnosis, she was informed that the client’s vet really only saw a handful of snakes a year and based on the presentation of the corkscrewing and other neurological symptoms, he was certain it was IBD. He completely disregarded the recent health history of the animal.

I’m not going to go into what a grossly inappropriate and presumptive diagnosis that was, but I will emphasize this: in the final stages of a critical infection, be it from an RI, septicemia, viral or fungal infections, the final progression of the disease ultimately ends with the snake displaying odd motor control abnormalities including corkscrewing and a general inability to right itself.

I asked my vet, who specializes in snakes and services the local zoos how much IBD she is seeing and she said “some” but stated she is seeing far more OPMV these days.

This led to a discussion on how she has seen other vets mis-diagnose OPMV as IBD due to the rapid onset death and final stage neurological abnormalities.

Then she said something that threw me for a bit of a loop. She mused that the early earth-shaking cases of IBD in boa and python collections, notably the ones that quickly wiped out entire collections, could have been OPMV in a collection with a few IBD asymptomatic animals. She dealt with an OPMV outbreak with a boa/ball breeder last year in which a total a 10 animals eventually died. Testing confirmed OPMV in the collection, but 4 of the 10 animals were also discovered to have IBD.

This has led her – and this is her opinion only – that IBD may be "present" in a lot of animals but may be present asymptomatically. Another virus like OPMV comes through and devastates a collection. The vet, noting an RI and neurological symptoms, tests for IBD and incorrectly assumes it to be the cause of all the mayhem when OPMV or another virus/infection is actually doing the killing.

Nothing set in stone, but interesting nonetheless. If nothing else, it emphasizes the need to take your animals to an experienced reptile vet when they fall ill, to perform necropsies on any animals that die of unknown illnesses, and to not assume IBD when an animal displays odd behavior.

Very interesting, thanks a bunch for sharing!

Very good information there. Sorry to hear the guy killed one of the snakes u bred. I'm even more thrilled that I have a good herp vet up here. Thanks for sharing

Like always very interesting and informative pots...

Thank you so much for sharing Your Knowledge and experience with us Skiploder:gj::gj::gj:

Hi,

Great post.

It always surprises me how reluctant people are to get necropsies done even though they have multiple animals potentially at risk. :confused:


dr del

Great information. Thanks so much for posting! :gj:

Excellent post, Craig! I only have one critique: You refer to "OPMV" several times, and it becomes a bit of a key element in your conclusion statements, but you don't tell us what OPMV is. Can you elaborate a bit more on that?

Thanks for sharing. It's always great to have more information on common/not so common illnesses. An experienced reptile vet is always good to have on hand, but sometimes can be hard to find. :(

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Originally Posted by dr del

Hi,

Great post.

It always surprises me how reluctant people are to get necropsies done even though they have multiple animals potentially at risk. :confused:


dr del

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It sounds more like this person wanted to profit from the death of an animal. Even if it had died of IBD it's unfair to blame the breeder after 7 years unless it has been in quarantine by itself for that long, which unrealistic. :rolleyes:

Great post

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Originally Posted by JLC

Excellent post, Craig! I only have one critique: You refer to "OPMV" several times, and it becomes a bit of a key element in your conclusion statements, but you don't tell us what OPMV is. Can you elaborate a bit more on that?

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OPMV is ophidian paramyxovirus.

It is a nasty virus. Oftentimes, there are no outward symptoms and you wake up to a dead snake. In larger collections in can spread rapidly as one of it's modes of transmission is through the air.

Othertimes, the animal goes off feed and then drops dead. Or, in some cases, there are signs of respiratory distress, and abnormal activity - lack of tongue flicking, listlessness or the snake displaying "death-throes".

Death throes are what we often see when a snake is terminally ill and it thrashes or convulses about. My vet says these are known as agonal movements. In some diseases, these movements are mistaken for neurological damage or disease. The animal will corkscrew about, hold it's head at weird angles and fail to right itself - sound familiar?

I'm far from an expert on OPMV but it can be easily researched.

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Originally Posted by Kinra

Thanks for sharing. It's always great to have more information on common/not so common illnesses. An experienced reptile vet is always good to have on hand, but sometimes can be hard to find. :(



It sounds more like this person wanted to profit from the death of an animal. Even if it had died of IBD it's unfair to blame the breeder after 7 years unless it has been in quarantine by itself for that long, which unrealistic. :rolleyes:

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I'm going to choose to be a bit more charitable..........................that is until he fails to pay me back for the necropsy. A full necropsy and histology ain't cheap.

I think a key point not to forget is that this whole incidence was brought on by feeding a prey item that was too large and then not properly dealing with the consequences of a regurge/vomiting episode.

i can add that even if your snake is just sick with something as simple as a respiratory infection its important to make sure your vet is properly doing his/her job. i learned the hard way.
i had ordered a snake online that came in sick. he had a respiratory infection and the seller was unwilling to take the animal back. so i took it to the vet and he said ok we will start him on baytril. he did no culture or sensitivity tests. even though i asked him to. he said their was no need as baytril was a broad spectrum anti biotic and it would wipe it out. well after a weeks worth of treatment snake showed no signs of getting better and died a few weeks later.
after reading on the boi of a few people that had bought from him ended up with uri and it was discovered that it was a common strain that was stronger than most and needed amakacin to wipe it out.
IF my vet had done the test he should have known what coarse of treatment to take.
adam jeffery

DR Jacobson who is well known is a specialist when it comes to OPMV here is some history on this nasty virus http://www.vetmed.ufl.edu/college/de...myxovirus.html

It's amazing to me that someone would feed a medium sized rat to a children's python. But then again, there is no limit to the bounds of bad judgement.

Agonal movements aren't just a snake thing. They're common to most animals, including humans. I've seen humans exhibit agonal movements after gunshot wounds, at the end of death from lung cancer, and a variety of other things. They manifest differently in different species, but they aren't caused by a single trauma or disease in any as far as I've seen.

Skiploader, I see where you're coming from about people jumping the gun and assuming that all snake agonal movements are from IBD. Agonal type movements are caused by IBD. I also saw them in a copperhead my father killed with a hoe and that copperhead certainly didn't develop a case of IBD while my father was killing it. (BTW, my father wasn't in the habit of killing snakes, even though he feared and loathed them. The copperhead was in my mother's rock garden where his kids were playing)

Agonal movements are a sign of great pain or impending death. A number of things can cause great pain or impending death--not just IBD. And a number of things can appear to be agonal movements but are not. I've seen humans with neurological problems who look as if they are having the agonal movements of humans all of the time. Even a doctor or vet can't diagnose solely on appearances so it's nuts to assume that one condition which causes a particular set of symptoms, like the ones that commonly manifest in IBD.

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Originally Posted by Skiploder

I'm far from an expert on OPMV but it can be easily researched.

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Thanks! That is exactly the sort of summary I was hoping for, so the basics of this critical information are here in one thread. I will certainly be doing far more in depth research on my own as well.

Thank you for the info and explanations. I "Favorited" this thread for future reference.

While I find this thread extremely informative and I'm very glad it was posted, I cannot wrap my mind around someone experiencing a regurge and then immediately feeding the snake again and then again while it kept regurging. This to me is all kinds of wrong.

Notwithstanding I know that a regurge in snakes is serious, common sense should tell someone even with no knowledge it's a bad thing. Especially if the food had started to rot, and undoubtedly it was supremely nasty, common sense should tell you the snake needs time to recover from that.

At least you were able to find out the real reason it died, which counts for something.

Gale

Thank you for posting. It definitely shows the importance of necropsies in unknown deaths.

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Originally Posted by angllady2

While I find this thread extremely informative and I'm very glad it was posted, I cannot wrap my mind around someone experiencing a regurge and then immediately feeding the snake again and then again while it kept regurging. This to me is all kinds of wrong.

Notwithstanding I know that a regurge in snakes is serious, common sense should tell someone even with no knowledge it's a bad thing. Especially if the food had started to rot, and undoubtedly it was supremely nasty, common sense should tell you the snake needs time to recover from that.

At least you were able to find out the real reason it died, which counts for something.

Gale

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Gale:

I can wrap my mind about it. We see people post about what to do here when it happens. Some people feel that a snake needs to eat every week - period. There appears to be some lack of fulfillment if that belly isn't full every week.

Frankly what I can't wrap my mind around is the fact that a vet would diagnose IBD despite a recent history of regurges obviously related to food size. When I got the call, it was not pleasant, it was literally "you sold me a snake with IBD and if you don't make it right I'm going to the BOI with you."

The fact that a vet would give that definitive diagnosis without a shred of proof, taking the history of the animal into account or even doing any testing is beyond me. FWIW, this vet is listed on the "List" of reptile vets that newcomers get referred to.

There are several things here that bear keeping in mind - first and foremost is find a good vet. Second, there are fatal consequences to not following proper recuperative protocols when dealing with a regurge. Lastly, vets appear to be seeing OPMV more than IBD, but are seeing asymptomatic IBD animals succumbing to OPMV - not IBD.

Remember all the early horror stories about people rapidly losing most of their collections to IBD? I do. While I discounted a few of them because there were never definitive proof of IBD (and these later played out in other places when it was discovered on one of the most famous "cases" that the killer was bacterial encephalitis) some of them were hard to ignore as inclusion bodies were ultimately found.

An inexperienced vet watches a snake rapidly die. The animal won't eat, comes down with a vicious RI that doesn't respond to treatment. In it's last two days it begins corkscrewing and flopping. The vet suspects IBD, the owner does a necropsy targeting the most commonly afflicted IBD tissues and boom - IBD is the culprit.

What my vet is saying that she is seeing cases where the above occurs, but the killer is OPMV and the animal is coincidentally an asymptomatic IBD carrier. A less experienced vet never considers OPMV and never looks for it.

It's something to think about.

You make a very good point.

No vet should make a diagnoses of any kind without asking what symptoms it had, what it's recent behavior was like, or at least running some tests.

That to me is like a doctor diagnosing me with e.coli because I have diarrhea, and not asking me about the 2 pounds of chocolate covered raisins I ate yesterday.

I certainly appreciate this information. I hope against hope I'll never have to deal with a serious condition like one of these, but now I know not to jump to conclusions and have the animal tested for many different things and not just IBD.

I will be sharing this information with my own reptile vet, and encouraging her to look into it on her own.

Gale

Another thing to think about Craig, is that you are farrrrrrr kinder than I. Had that guy called me SEVEN years after purchasing and copped an attitude I would not be fronting for any tests anyplace. In fact, my "Piss Off" after his rant would hopefully be enough to convey that succinctly.

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Originally Posted by wilomn

Another thing to think about Craig, is that you are farrrrrrr kinder than I. Had that guy called me SEVEN years after purchasing and copped an attitude I would not be fronting for any tests anyplace. In fact, my "Piss Off" after his rant would hopefully be enough to convey that succinctly.

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Wes, that was my initial reaction - 7 years? Go find a pile a sand, a hammer and, well, you know the rest.

When he first contacted me I was busy with work so I told him to send me the vet info, the feed/crap logs and I'd call him back later. That gave me an opportunity to think and weigh which way I wanted to go. Thank God the animal had just died and he refrigerated it.

When I saw the history of regurges and discussed the timeline with him, I had already pretty much come to a conclusion on what happened. At that point, without the backing of a professional opinion I figured this could devolve fairly quickly to an argument between me and his vet. I'll admit it, I approached this as if we were going to end up on the BOI.

This is a dude who bought a trio of anthills, a trio of childreni, two female womas and a pair of blackheads over the last 8 years.......and he bought those womas back when I was getting $1200 for a female. I figured in that time, he'd spent some good coin on me.

So in the end I bit my tongue and decided to have my vet debunk his vet. In the end, our good doctor thoroughly exposed his sawbones for the part time reptile hack that he was. Have I got an apology for the accusation and the threat to take me to the BOI? No. At this point I don't care.............

The histology and the necropsy set me back about $575.00. It's a steep tab but in order to get clear on the IBD they look at several things. They also looked for damage to the lung in an attempt to rule out the possibility of OPMV. I hyperventilated when I was told that if they did find inclusions, they would then have to differentiate if they were IBD inclusions or inclusions from another virus. Yep, check every option on that form Doc, I've got American Express.

I've got an e-mail with a promise to drop off a check on the porch this weekend. That check clears and I figure we're square.

He posts here and he posts on Fauna. While I'm still debating whether or not to out that "vet" of his, I'll leave him anonymous.

Thought. Ponderation. The ending, or unbeginning, of many an argument that never happened.

I've used them myself on rare occasions. Useful they can be.

Sometimes I just miss The Wild West of Faunathatwas.

You handled this quite well, which not a surprise at all.

I have different Question at this point... If I good remember that was You Skiploder writing here about snakes living with IBD dont showing typical "hard core' symptoms..

Is even possible theoretically speaking That IBD will "hide" for SEVEN YEARS :O and just pop up like that ??

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Originally Posted by Aes_Sidhe

I have different Question at this point... If I good remember that was You Skiploder writing here about snakes living with IBD dont showing typical "hard core' symptoms..

Is even possible theoretically speaking That IBD will "hide" for SEVEN YEARS :O and just pop up like that ??

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Rafal:

My understanding is that there is no time limit that has been defined in which animals may remain asymptomatic. The time limit may be indefinite.

So yes, I suppose it's entirely possible. However this animal was thoroughly necropsied and was IBD free.

Skip
Thanks for the great post! Fronting 575.00 is really priceless to find out an amazing piece of information such as this one. I too will be copy and paste and forward this to my vet. Im hoping this Info is already on his radar screen but ya never know.
Thanks!


Check out what's new on my website... www.Homegrownscales.com

Totally sticky please itll be good if everyone here learnt from this and quit jumping to so many unsubstantiated conclusions trying to find someone to blame.

The thing that makes me sad is not everywhere has a great reptile vet. The only reptile vet we have is doing lots to learn fast but still is missing experience but at least she is willing to listen and accepts that she doesn't have as much experience as she would like. I am sure not everywhere is as lucky as I am and has the heavy handed 'I have a doctorate and you don't so I know more than you do', vets. In my case the vet I'd like to take my animals to is just short of 19 hours away by car.

As always an excellent post.

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Originally Posted by kitedemon

The thing that makes me sad is not everywhere has a great reptile vet.....

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I am also saddened and worried by this. I wish more vets would be open to learning about different animals. I have a pair of sugar gliders and I have to travel 45 min to get to a qualified exotics vet. And my herp vet is 30 min away. I don't mind that, in fact I think I'm pretty fortunate, but it is concerning that there are folks in large cities who don't have a qualified vet within driving distance....

Thank you so much for such an informative post! I am sorry you had to deal with something like this, but it can really benefit the reptile community and we owe you a lot for sharing so much. If I may, I would encourage you to let us know the name of that vet. Not so we can gossip about it and I would certainly not disclose the buyer's name, but knowing the vet can help prevent repeated future mis-diagnosis. At the very least, perhaps let the mods know so they can remove the name from the list to which newbies are referred.

Mods, please sticky???

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Originally Posted by kitedemon

The thing that makes me sad is not everywhere has a great reptile vet.

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This is why it is SO important to care for our pets in the best way possible. 99% of the time, a reptile illness can be prevented or even cured by proper knowledge from the keeper! It is for those rare instances when there is something simply above our capabilities/requiring extreme medical interference or needing medical tools not in our possession that we need to call upon reptile vets.

Honestly this too also shows the importance of knowing how to properly care for your animal. While a good reptile vet should have known what was wrong, the keeper should have as well. :colbert:

We can never stop studying our animals, it's important to continue to strive to learn the best care possible!

'Tis stuck. :)

Speaking of good reptile vets...how do I know if the ones in my area are "good." Aside from reading posts and reviews on clinics..which can often be misleading, is there a good way to determine a good vet. I.E. what kinds of questions do I ask to verify their experience?

I am from Augusta, GA...

Thank GOD for Forums like this ! A month ago I jumped into "BP Heaven" and have been growing my family from one to now three. Seven years ago when I moved to Chico CA, I secured a very reliable vet who works with my director at a local wildlife center. This past year, a new Vet Hospital was built and five vets went with this idea of bringing full service to ONE location and keeping the location at a moment's drive instead of out of route in case emergencies arise.
This year is my first year with reptiles and now embarking on an incredible journey which i should have done 20 years ago. Never too late I say...

A personal vet is a LIFESAVER and vital asset for my BPs. My female just had her Barium Fecal and she is clean of all parasites. My next two kids will follow within the next month. I am now in the process of securing much needed information by book, internet, whatever I can get my hands on. " Feeling pretty much like a college kid at this point."LOL.:D

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Originally Posted by Skiploder

He posts here and he posts on Fauna. While I'm still debating whether or not to out that "vet" of his, I'll leave him anonymous.

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While I'm not sure that the vet should be completely discredited (they may be great with cats and dogs, but not so much with reptiles), I do think it's important that, if the recommended herp vet list is a part of this site, the vet's name is removed. It's one thing if I were to go into the first vet I saw asking for help with my animal, and having an inexperienced vet attempt to help. If I were to find a vet at the recommendation of others, and they misdiagnosed/mistreated my animal, it would call into question the experience and quality of those that created the list as well as the vet.

Knowledge is power, and if there are people to avoid -- even those with the best of intentions -- I'd rather be able to make a fully informed decision. So, maybe not the full BOI for the vet, but at least gently redirect those looking to that person for the treatment of their herps.