Baytril Treatment Help

[warac67]

My beardie was just taken to the vet and I was told to give a 0.1 treatment of Baytril twice a day. Today was the first day that I am suppose to administer this to him. He's a very sweet gently boy and even at the vet's yesterday with all the poking and prodding, he was as calm and gentle. But today when I tried to administer his medicine he flipped like I've never seen before. I tried putting a little on the outside of his lips, so when he'd open his mouth to lick it off I could slip the syringe in and give him the medicine. But instead of trying to lick it off he started crazily rubbing him mouth all over everything. Almost like it was burning him and had to get it off that moment. He was very irate and started running around his enclosure still rubbing his mouth around. I let him settle down and then tried it again and repeated this process until I finally was able to get the medicine in by prodding open the side of mouth and quickly emptying the syringe. He instantly reacted and ran around rubbing his face rapidly on anything he could find. I felt awful he seemed so uncomfortable and angry. This was the first dose of 19 more I will need to give him before he goes to the follow up vet visit. I tried to call the vet to see if that's a normal reaction and they were closed.I did google it a bit and it seemed some beardies have fought the administration of the medicine as well. But I haven't seen anything about the intense mouth rubbing that he was doing, that's what's really concerning me. After a minute or two he did stop the rubbing and seemed to settle down, but it was just so odd. Has anyone heard of a reaction like this to 0.1 baytril? Any easier techniques of administering the medicine so it causes him the least amount of stress? Any advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[CooperDragon]

It sounds like he doesn't like the taste of it. Does your vet have any flavoring you can mix in with it? If not, perhaps you can mix it with just a tiny bit of honey or sweet potato baby food to see if he likes the flavor (kind of like sneaking a pill to a dog inside a spoonful of peanut butter).

 

[kingofnobbys]

We had a similar experience with our first rescue (a little juvenile water skink who I rescued from nextdoor's cat).
Hated to oral antibiotics that I had to administer via a syringe with the just the flexible tube of a catheter attached.
Would do everything he could to make it hard to access his mouth and slip the catheter's plastic tube into the corner of his mouth and far enough in to be sure the stuff went into his mouth.

Was a two person job - I'd have to grab Lucky firmly to stop him from squirming or jumping off my hand/ tummy and with the other hand direct the catheter into the corner of his mouth and my wife then quickly pressed the plunger. Required at least 4 hands.

Lucky's immediate response was a huge YUCK! response and a temper tantrum (on my tummy under 2 cupped hands for about 30 seconds, and then he'd settle and I'd apologise profusely and give him lots loving and petting and big snuggle and a tasty YUMMY food treat , and all would be well until next dose (was 2x per day) .
We even tried being sneaky and hiding the syringe and medicine bottle from him and only getting him out of his "hospital tub" when everything was ready, never worked , he always knew and would respond exactly the same. They are very smart and definitely remember these things.

Lucky was only about 18g !!!, a full grown beardie (about 500 - 700g) if he decides he doesn't like the medicine and doesn't want it will be more than a handful. Wonder if it is possible to inject the stuff into some big crickets or his favourate worms, or mix it with some nice sweet natural fruit juice, and so disguise it ?

 

[AHBD]

I agree with the other posters to try to disguise the flavor or inject it into a juicy bug. Just wondering, does Onyx have a respiratory infection ?