BallPythonNut53
New member
I don't post very often so if this isn't the right place feel free to move it or let me know what is the right place.
I wanted to post this mainly because of what ended up happening. I'm including pictures, these are from the beginning of July. What other beardie owners need to know is that the bump turned out to be an abscess, and the inside of his mouth, by his teeth, was redder (like more the color of blood than the pink you see in the pictures, I couldn't get a good angle on it at the time), more inflamed than the normal pink you'd see. When we took him to a vet in August, they didn't properly diagnose it and suggested antibiotic ointment and to monitor for if it got bigger. A few weeks ago it was getting worse - he had a discharge on the edges of his mouth, he was less interested in food, and we took him to a different vet who knew what it was right away and prescribed oral antibiotics mostly because of the infection. They also cut and drained the abscess.
He passed away over the weekend, probably because it wasn't caught and treated soon enough and had probably already spread. By the time we started treating it, he'd probably had both the abscess and the bump for about 4-5 months. He was less than 3 years old.
If you look in your beardie's mouth and it's red and inflamed, please, please take them to a vet that specializes in reptiles and ask them to fully look in their mouth. If you see an abrupt bump like the one below, an abscess is one possibility and from what I can find, those need to be drained so they don't become infected.
If you go to a vet and they don't seem to know what they're doing, you have that gut feeling and you're like "hm I don't know about what they're telling me this feels off" don't hesitate to get a second opinion.
I wanted to post this mainly because of what ended up happening. I'm including pictures, these are from the beginning of July. What other beardie owners need to know is that the bump turned out to be an abscess, and the inside of his mouth, by his teeth, was redder (like more the color of blood than the pink you see in the pictures, I couldn't get a good angle on it at the time), more inflamed than the normal pink you'd see. When we took him to a vet in August, they didn't properly diagnose it and suggested antibiotic ointment and to monitor for if it got bigger. A few weeks ago it was getting worse - he had a discharge on the edges of his mouth, he was less interested in food, and we took him to a different vet who knew what it was right away and prescribed oral antibiotics mostly because of the infection. They also cut and drained the abscess.
He passed away over the weekend, probably because it wasn't caught and treated soon enough and had probably already spread. By the time we started treating it, he'd probably had both the abscess and the bump for about 4-5 months. He was less than 3 years old.
If you look in your beardie's mouth and it's red and inflamed, please, please take them to a vet that specializes in reptiles and ask them to fully look in their mouth. If you see an abrupt bump like the one below, an abscess is one possibility and from what I can find, those need to be drained so they don't become infected.
If you go to a vet and they don't seem to know what they're doing, you have that gut feeling and you're like "hm I don't know about what they're telling me this feels off" don't hesitate to get a second opinion.
Always hard to swallow when vets don't know what they are doing-- and you trusting their judgement - I am sorry about your dragon-
