Help Ball Python tore scales

[Slicercrush]

Update would be nice, hope shes feeling at least a little better.

That injury made me cringe a bit. Needless to say, you'll enjoy the CSerpants rack, currently using one myself for my two snakes. Great place, and it will certainly keep her well to recover. Id probably keep her on paper towels for a while, even after its stitched up, so you can monitor anything that may be...coming out...of the cut in the future, or if she re-tears it.

Hope she feels better soon, poor girl.

[mattj86]

Sorry for the late update. I am at the vet waiting now. The vet would/could not see her till now. The vet told me she is going to have to sedate her and clean the wound well, as well as try to stitch it. She will also administer an injectable antibiotic. They will be sending me home with a cream and the injectable antibiotic. I have never given a snake an injection before, so, I am a little nervous about that. The vet is going to walk me through it before I leave. I had to drive 1.5 hrs to find a vet that would see her, so, I cant come back everyday for them to do the injection. I will update again once i get home with how everything went.

[Bogertophis]

Sounds like you've had a long day...so glad you got her in to see the vet finally & it sounds like she'll soon be on the mend.

[hilabeans]

There are some good Youtube videos that show how to do injections. This one from Snake Discovery comes to mind...



I would watch several so you can see how it's done. Nothing beats life experience, but at least you can watch as often as needed to build up your confidence.

So sorry you two are going thru this, hopefully she'll much better stitched up with meds.

[mattj86]

Thank you all for the kind words. I will watch that video. The vet is also going to show me how to do it. The vet seems confident that she will be fine. Just going to have to keep an eye on it while the cut heals.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[Jus1More]

That looks painful, but I am glad you got her treatment and hopefully she will heal nicely. Please keep us posted and keep your chin up!

[mattj86]

Alright, finally got home!

4 stitches, antibiotics(injectable), Silver Sulfadiazine cream, Betadine wash, 6 hours, $280, 170 miles and she is good as new. Well not really, but, the Veterinarian said she should make a full recovery! She seemed to have experience with reptiles and cared. She has seen this happen a few times with the stick-on thermometers.

I have to go back in 28 days to get the stitches removed. Until then, antibiotic shot every 3 days (10 shots total), Betadine wash/soak once a day and apply the SSD cream twice a day. No food for 2 weeks.

I will snap a picture tomorrow, I don't want to bother her anymore she has been through a lot today.

Thanks again for the support!!

[Bogertophis]

That was a very expensive stick-on "cheapie" thermometer...ouch! But it sounds like you found the right vet & your snake is in great hands.

[Armiyana]

Ouch, poor baby! Glad to see the vet saw her so soon!

Obviously, feeding is going to be an issue for a while.
I would definitely give time for this to heal over a bit. The 2 weeks is a very good suggestion to wait on.
And this type of wound will take a while to heal! It may even pucker up a bit where you will have to monitor for stuck shed. One snake I'd seen had a little flap where the skin healed on itself.

I don't know what the vet said, but with a snake with a nasty cut on it's neck in the past I had to feed much, much smaller prey every 4 days until it was mostly healed over. Double check with the vet for when they suggest feeding! But I would try to make it a small enough meal that it does not stretch the wound at all. It can put the healing process back quite a bit if it pops back open.
The snake I cared for was a young baby ball, but we did pinkies for 3 months until the skin healed enough to slowly size back up to small adult mice.

[Craiga 01453]

Thanks for the update!

I'm glad to hear she's doing ok and on the road to a FULL recovery.
In addition to waiting 2 weeks to feed, I'd also feed smaller prey for the first couple feedings to ensure that the injured area doesn't get stretched out and pop the stiches/re-open the wound.

Your vet sounds pretty knowledgeable, so I'd say it's worth the 90 minute drive, since we hear some nightmarish stories about vets on here fairly often.

Good luck moving forward, please keep us updated periodically.