Possible Impaction, x ray shows misaligned spine!!!!

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Kilpela92

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My beardie Eskimo is 2 years old now. He had a problem with gout a while back, recently we had to have a small portion of his tail amputated due to tail rot. I stopped giving him allopurinol because of the antibiotics and pain meds he was prescribed and I made sure to hydrate him very well, gave him kidney support and Bene-bect. He had one week left till the rest of his stitches were out, he had been off the other meds and back onto allopurinol, then last Wednesday I noticed him not wanting to use his arms and it got bad fast from there...He flipped himself upside down somehow when I went out to the grocery store, luckily I was only gone for about 30 minutes but he had pooped and it was a terrifying experience. Yesterday I syringe fed him a little bit of alfalfa powder mixed with water, he was fine for about 10 minutes then he started spitting it back up, it was coming out of his nose, his eyes were watering. All I knew to do was to hold him and tilt his body downward so it could come out of his mouth. You may be asking why didn’t I bring him to a vet sooner, well the only reliable vet around is only open Tuesday to Friday...Anyway he has fought hard and I honestly thought he wouldn’t make it but I got him in as soon as they opened today. I thought it may have been impaction because he bit the tip off of a syringe a little over a week prior to all the problems. I received the full body x ray just a little while ago and it tells a different tale. The vet said he thinks it could be a blockage still even though it isn’t apparent. But I can clearly see his spine is misaligned. The vet did say there was a lot going on so maybe it was a sort of nice way of making me not worry as much. Either way he asked if it was okay to send it to one of the top 3 specialists in bearded dragon surgery and I had him do it immediately. We are keeping him at the vet overnight, hoping he will pull through. We are giving it one more day to see if anything the doctors can do will make a significant difference or perhaps from examining the x rays, if not we may have to put this beautiful boy down. I’ll post the picture of the x-ray as soon as I can remember how to do it. None of this has to do with his husbandry, in case anyone was wondering.
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AHBD

BD.org Sicko
Hi there, I'm sorry to hear all the trouble you're beardie Eskimo is having. :( Some important Q's . what exact type of lights [ give the name + strength ] , especially uvb are you using ? I know you said husbandry is good but please post pics of his set up including lights. So the amount + type of meds. he's on can all cause stomach upset as well as seizures. So you have 2 possible scenarios, or a combination of the two. Bad reaction to the meds. as well as calcium deficiency. A slightly crooked spine will have almost no effect such as serious balance or impaction. If he poo'd 6 days ago when you found him flipped over then there's no indication that he's impacted. So this is almost certainly bad reaction to all those meds. and/or calcium deficiency .
 

Kilpela92

Member
Original Poster
He has been off the other meds for 16 days now, I wouldn’t think it to be likely they could affect him now. It was only a liquid poop, and he has acted like he’s trying to poo a few times but nothing came out, not sure if that makes a difference because I thought they could still poo liquid and be blocked up somewhere? He didn’t have a seizure, he just doesn’t use his arms because they hurt him and when he tried to get away from the poo he flipped himself over. He has a T5HO sunbeam, removed the reflector because of distance issues, basking area maxes at 104-94 cool side of the enclosure is about 79. I have a 6.5R Solarmeter that I check the UVI with, the sunbeam sits about 8 inches from his basking spot and it reads 3.4-3.9 depending on where you put it. His basking light is a halogen flood, 75watt. I will know more from the other tests tomorrow hopefully if he makes it through the night
 

Drache613

BD.org Sicko
Staff member
Moderator
Hello,

So sorry your dragon is having so much trouble! Is he still on antibiotics right now?
Your T5 tube bulb brand is called the Sunbeam? I am not familiar with that particular
brand, is it made in China? Where did you purchase it? That is interesting however,
that your UV meter is giving those readings which are not bad.
His behavior really sounds like calcium issues. How long has he been flipping? If he
continues this, I would highly recommend switching out your T5 UVB tube to either
the Reptisun 10 or the Arcadia D3 12% both have the T5 tube bulb available.
I hope he makes it through the night, keep us posted on him.

Tracie
 

Kilpela92

Member
Original Poster
Sorry it’s a sun blaster fixture, not sunbeam, with a high output 10.0 reptisun tube. His calcium levels were perfect so it had nothing to do with that, his bone density in the x-ray clearly shows that. He was genetically defected, being a citrus morph like he is, it was most likely from a bad breeder. He was my 2nd beardie so I didn’t know as much when I got him. He was not deficient in anything, besides being just slightly dehydrated. Nothing was done wrong on the husbandry side. He fought till the very end but that is precisely why I had to put him down. It was the humane thing to do. All I wanted on here was opinions on the x-ray, which we are still waiting to hear back from the specialist even though Eskimo is gone. For future reference Tracie it would be appreciative to believe that when someone has multiple bearded dragons and that husbandry is not a problem, to not assume it is and make someone who is losing a family member feel even worse. I understand the concept, but it was not helpful in the slightest.
 

AHBD

BD.org Sicko
I'm so so sorry that your boy Eskimo did not make it. :( It's so sad to see a scaly friend go through such trauma and end up leaving us so soon. My heart goes out to. I'm sure Tracie was trying to be thorough, please believe that there are often threads where the owner says husbandry is all good but then they post pics or list names of inferior equipment. So I know that Tracie is as compassionate as they come and will be very sad for you about this outcome. I send my true heartfelt sympathy to you and wish you peace at this sad time. :(
 

Kilpela92

Member
Original Poster
Thank you AHBD, I know I’m just upset over all this and Tracies heart was in the right place because sadly husbandry is normally the problem, though her responses did seem calloused and definitely did not make me feel great (which I suppose is one con to a forum discussion, interpretation) plus the fact I have posted here a few times and I have showed his husbandry before I wrongly assumed a name like Eskimo would be remembered with the 1000+ posts she has read through. So I apologize again, it was more my fault for not emphasizing that I wanted input on the x ray more then anything else. The main thing is that I’m still going to find out what the expert says about his x ray and I will update this thread when I know more, just in case someone has a similar problem. Eskimo liked a happy spunky life, we took him with us often, he was able to mate with our female, so he experienced a decent amount. We have one baby from the clutch he fertilized that he will live on through. I just hope anyone new to getting a bearded dragon reads this —— Do not get a morph of any kind for your first, or even 2nd dragon unless it is from a very very reputable place and not shipped. I was lucky and was able to give him a decent life, but I’m sure many too many are not as lucky.
 
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