severe swelling in the lower jaw

[johnabrams82]

OK, I am ashamed to even say this but I think I may have a very sick snake on my hands here. she is a 2500 gram female and two days ago I fed her a large rat, not insanely large but a good size rat. well now for the problem the day after I noticed her jaw looked a little stretched. i thought it was strange but I left her for then. well yesterday I noticed it actually had swollen considerably. after examining her, her mouth seems about the right color except 1 small red mark in the front of it. about the size of the tip of a pen. well some yellowish liquid came out from her teeth when i pushed on her lower jaw. so I decided i was taking her to the vet. now this morning the swelling is twice as bad as yesterday its swollen down into her neck and it looks like even the top right side of her head is a little swollen.
I thought maybe mouth rot, but she hasn't shown any symptoms until now. I'm worried she may have ripped something.
does anyone have any ideas on what this is, or if its even treatable? I want to take her to the vet, but I'm worried there may be nothing they can do for her.

[Freakie_frog]

The liquid sounds like its infected it could be that she got a rat claw or infected tooth. I'd say get her to the vet have them look at it. You'll more than likely be put on a round of insatiable antibiotics.

[twh]

to the vet ASAP !!!

[frankykeno]

Vet time. Just make sure the vet you choose has snake experience if at all possible (I know in some areas that's darn hard to find). Don't give up on her. You'd be very surprised at how much these snakes can come back from and how naturally hardy they are. We've seen many examples here at BPNet of snakes that were very ill or very injured and they are now living normal, healthy lives. Just make sure you write down what the vet says because it's so easy to miss some of the information while you're dealing with a health emergency.

Please let us know how the vet appointment went.

On a side note, I don't know what type of substrate you use but you may want to temporarily switch that over to layers of plain white paper towels. I personally prefer the Viva brand since it's cloth soft. That way you can easily see any discharge and keep the snake on a very soft, non-abrasive surface while it heals.

[johnabrams82]

yeah im using shredded aspen currently but today i'm switching everyone back to unprinted newspaper. I'm not taking ANY more chances.

[SatanicIntention]

Sounds like an abscess. She'll need a good few weeks of antibiotics and may need to have surgery to clean the wound out.

Also, try to feed smaller rats. I have females that are your girl's size and they get maybe 3-4 mice a week. They are chubby, well-fleshed girls too. Try to stick with weaned/small rats, and feed a second one if she just HAS to have it.

[johnabrams82]

the vet said it looked like some sort of trama to the jaw. he said it definatly wasn't mouth rot and it didnt look like there were any foreign bodies in her mouth so he gave me a bottle of antibiotics and I have to give her .5cc every day for 14 days. i feal much better now he acted like it wasn't a big problem. and by the way since I know most people ask this alot the vet check plus the whole bottle of antibiots was $99 even. so not that bad really.

[frankykeno]

It's good to read that it wasn't anything too major and I hope she responds well to this treatment.

John, if you were pleased with your herp vet and haven't already submitted him/her for our Recommended Exotic Vets List please feel free to PM me with the information and I'll happily include your vet.

[johnabrams82]

he seems to be somewhat knowlegable, but I will refrain from posting until I have dealt with him more. he did say that he personally keeps boas though.

[frankykeno]

No problem, John, just let me know down the road if you would like to have him included in the list. We do want the list to reflect personal experiences of our membership so I'm glad you are waiting until you've got to know this vet and his skills with herps better.