Urgent please help: Peaches got hurt

[Godzilla78]

If I am wrong, then I am wrong. Go ahead and follow the vet's advice and TRY to feed a weaned rat with medicine inside it EVERY DAY. Let me know how that works, and good luck with that. If the strategy works, I will eat my words, and apologize, if the strategy fails, call the vet back and tell them, that sure enough the snake won't eat veery day, and NOW WHAT DO I DO? I just want what is best for the snake, and I cannot foresee the snake eating a small weaned rat every day.
But what do I know? I am just a

people online who aren't even in the same country.

lol, I hope it works, I hope the vet is right, so your snake heals. I am not a vet, so I don't know what else to do, and I am not dispensing any medical advice, I am just stating that the feeding idea sounds unrealistic, and I have fed ball pythons approximately 400 times in the last few years.

[Godzilla78]

If the vet says that the snake needs food in the stomach in order to safely feed the medicine, then just feed to snake one normal meal. It will take quite a few days to digest that one meal.
Or try to feed smaller prey items daily, like small mice.

[Booper]

If I am wrong, then I am wrong. Go ahead and follow the vet's advice and TRY to feed a weaned rat with medicine inside it EVERY DAY. Let me know how that works, and good luck with that. If the strategy works, I will eat my words, and apologize, if the strategy fails, call the vet back and tell them, that sure enough the snake won't eat veery day, and NOW WHAT DO I DO? I just want what is best for the snake, and I cannot foresee the snake eating a small weaned rat every day.
But what do I know? I am just a
lol, I hope it works, I hope the vet is right, so your snake heals. I am not a vet, so I don't know what else to do, and I am not dispensing any medical advice, I am just stating that the feeding idea sounds unrealistic, and I have fed ball pythons approximately 400 times in the last few years.

I have already said that feeding her isn't working, so we phoned the vet to see if it would work to just feed her on her own. I never said that I did not want to listen to people from other countries, I am saying that people here are telling me not to, and it's confusing me and making me worried that if I do what the vet says it will be wrong but also if something I do from what someone on here has told me to do is wrong too, do that make more sense? I get the feeling from your 'internet tone' you are angry and I don't know what I've done to upset you, but I am very scared and worried because this is the first time this has happened for me and I am extremely worried about doing the wrong thing, does that make more sense?

[Godzilla78]

I have already said that feeding her isn't working, so we phoned the vet to see if it would work to just feed her on her own. I never said that I did not want to listen to people from other countries, I am saying that people here are telling me not to, and it's confusing me and making me worried that if I do what the vet says it will be wrong but also if something I do from what someone on here has told me to do is wrong too, do that make more sense? I get the feeling from your 'internet tone' you are angry and I don't know what I've done to upset you, but I am very scared and worried because this is the first time this has happened for me and I am extremely worried about doing the wrong thing, does that make more sense?

No, I am absolutely not angry. If the feeding strategy is not working, than what did the vet say to do? I am just ridiculing the vet's medicinal administration method. There must be a better method, especially if the prescribed method fails completely. I don't think force-feeding the snake would be a great idea either. Not sure about that, but again, if the snake won't take a weaned rat, try a very small prey item.

[Booper]

No, I am absolutely not angry. If the feeding strategy is not working, than what did the vet say to do? I am just ridiculing the vet's medicinal administration method. There must be a better method, especially if the prescribed method fails completely. I don't think force-feeding the snake would be a great idea either. Not sure about that, but again, if the snake won't take a weaned rat, try a very small prey item.

Thank you for clearing that up, I'm sorry for over reacting and accusing you of being angry. We have tiny mouse pups we can try, but like another user mentioned before I am worried that if I inject the prey and it takes a while to digest, I could end up overdosing Peaches which I really don't want to do.

Just to clarify. If I can get peaches to eat a smaller meal (like the small weaned rat) every, say, 5 days would it be okay to give metacam orally, as there would be food in her stomach?

[Godzilla78]

Thank you for clearing that up, I'm sorry for over reacting and accusing you of being angry. We have tiny mouse pups we can try, but like another user mentioned before I am worried that if I inject the prey and it takes a while to digest, I could end up overdosing Peaches which I really don't want to do.

Just to clarify. If I can get peaches to eat a smaller meal (like the small weaned rat) every, say, 5 days would it be okay to give metacam orally, as there would be food in her stomach?

I don't know, I am not a vet. What did the vet say to do? If the vet just said, "just feed it every day," then what did they say to do, if that fails?
In my opinion, I would say YES, feed the small weaned rat every 4-5 days, and give the metacam orally as Zina illustrated. It makes sense from the vet's advice that the metacam be given on a full stomach, and it makes sense from a ball python keeper's advice that most pythons won't eat every day.

But again, ask the vet. "what do I do? The snake won't eat every day, just like the ball python experts said!" Either force-feeding a tiny prey item, or naturally feeding every 4-5 days, along with daily oral administration of the metacam dosage seems the only options to me.

GOOD LUCK to your booper! I had a snake get stuck in the lid once also, and it was so scary! The injury was not nearly as bad as your case though. That injury looks pretty nasty, but I am glad there are no broken ribs! That is great news, the vet gave you! I am not saying you have a bad vet, they may be a great vet. I am just saying it seems they have very little knowledge or experience with snakes, based on the feeding advice. Reptiles require a specialist type of vet.

[zina10]

Thank you for clearing that up, I'm sorry for over reacting and accusing you of being angry. We have tiny mouse pups we can try, but like another user mentioned before I am worried that if I inject the prey and it takes a while to digest, I could end up overdosing Peaches which I really don't want to do.

Just to clarify. If I can get peaches to eat a smaller meal (like the small weaned rat) every, say, 5 days would it be okay to give metacam orally, as there would be food in her stomach?

Please don't get to stressed !!

Let's figure this out

Everybody is just confused at your vet's dosing method, because snakes usually do not eat daily. And we are talking Ball Pythons here, and on top of that, a stressed and injured one. It just seems odd.

But your snake isn't going to die, probably not even if it gets NONE of that medicine in it. Didn't you say it was sort of a anti inflammatory ? Or is it supposed to keep infection at bay ?
Did the vet give you anything to prevent infection ?

Do you have another vet you could ring and ask about this ? Is this vet a reptile specialist ? Just take your time answering, please do not stress in between. Peaches will be fine, even if she doesn't get the meds right this second, so lets just figure this out


edited to say: Don't feed weaned rats daily either way. That would amount to a small rat within 2 days, and a large rat in no time. I'm pretty sure you don't need to stress the snake with a huge meal right now, they can't digest that fast. This method would only work if you find rat fuzzies or something of that sort. Not sure the snake would take that?

[zina10]

Ok, I went back and re-read your post. So its a anti inflammatory. Never really heard of giving that to a snake, but possibly some vets do.

Usually, you give anti inflammatory for pain and perhaps, swelling. Sort of like we do with Ibuprofen. Usually anti inflammatory ARE taken with food (in mammals anyway) and they can cause stomach irritations. NO idea about snakes or that particular med, though.

I would really like to hear what Deborah or other very experienced keepers have to say about this, is there a way to tag someone ?

Since that medicine is a anti inflammatory, it is not going to be something that will decide whether your snake lives or dies. So please don't stress over it to much.

For now, until you figure that out, just keep your baby comfy and warm, perfect husbandry, super clean enclosure, and dab the wounds with a weak betadine solution a couple times or at least once the day. Until they are not open anymore..

You did good going to the vet. It means you care and try to do the right thing. Sometimes though, vets aren't really reptile experts, and its always helpful to get another opinion. Of course you should listen to your vet, but if you get a funny feeling about it, it never hurts to ask another vet or some experts.

[Godzilla78]

Good research Zina, if the only medicine is an anti-inflammatory, then what is supposed to prevent infections? That is the real danger here, infection, not tissue inflammation.

She's given us Metacam (an anti-inflammatory) to give to Peaches orally as they wouldn't let us inject it at home, and so the plan is to put it in a small weaned rat to give her each evening for the next few days.

Yeah, find a vet that understands reptiles. This isn't a puppy that needs comforting, and medicine in its dog chow.

[zina10]

Ok, there are quite a bit of stories about Metacam online.

It IS used on reptiles, but the experiences the owners had, vary wildly.

It IS mostly for pain relief and some inflammation, and like with all those medicines, care must be taken not to overdose. Under dosing on the other hand, leaves little "effect".


Now..this is MY OWN PERSONAL FEELING about this. I wouldn't be comfortable with the meds or the instruction. If this was given by syringe/injection (which it can be) it is MUCH easier to give the correct dosage with the correct time line.

The daily dosage with feeding makes me uncomfortable. To many variables. What if the snake doesn't eat. What if it doesn't eat on day 2 or 3 or ? Just how soon is the med effective if injected into the rodent? Will it be effective immediately? In a couple of days? Will it double up if 2 or 3 food items are still being digested 2 or 3 days into this?

I just don't know. Not giving me the warm and fuzzies.

If ALL this does is help with pain, I'd be tempted to leave it out. While pain relief can be a nice thing, I would worry to much of dosing error and toxicity or other side effects. Snakes metabolism is quite different then a mammals.

I'm not a vet, though. And I may be wrong. Just sharing my thoughts.

I think I would make sure the vet is a reptile specialist, esp. snakes. Then I would bring up the concerns and discuss them. Ask about alternatives. Ask about possible injections. Ask about meds preventing infection. At least a topical one. And if you aren't comfortable or if that vet is not a reptile specialist, try to get in touch with another one. At least over the phone for now, ask for a consultation.