RESPIRATORY INFECTION?

[Mayonaise]

Hello I just joined in hopes for help, this is a really long post and thanks so much for reading I appreciate it a lot.

I need help, I think my bearded dragon "Mayo" might have a respiratory infection. I've been to 2 vets but they don't think Mayo has a RI. Some symptoms she has are: mouth gaping, saliva strings, little crust by tip of mouth, gaps and puffs for air while sleeping and awake, sometimes swallows when nothing in her mouth, when eating dubias/veggies and drinking water sometimes chokes and breathes hard. This has been going on since August. Despite all of this she still has a big appetite. Today she ate mouth fulls of collards, 10 wax worms, and 12 butter worms and she still wants to eat more worms but no more collards after.

- 1st time I brought her to the vet, they said she looked fine and checked her mouth etc. Was given "Ceftazidime Injections" for about 21 days. Injected into the muscle every 3 days. I don't know if she looked better or not because she still had her mouth open etc. but maybe a lil less.

- I then tried to medicate her myself by buying reptaid and nebulizing her for about 2-3 months and sometimes it seems like she got better but then some days she still opened her mouth.

- I brought her to the vet a 2nd time recently and the vet said that she looked fine when checking her mouth and took blood tests and X-ray. The doc said the X-ray looked fine and didn't seem like she had any problems with her lungs, mouth, respiratory tract etc. I was given "Enrofloxacin (baytril)". Told me to give 0.1cc by mouth every 12 hours for 14 days. I haven't tried this med yet. I'm kinda scared to give it to her because she just lost some weight from laying eggs and I want to get her fat enough before I start giving her meds. I've read where baytril can make them not each so much after taking it.

- So far these past months she had shed, brumate, laid 2 clutches of eggs so far and one being recent as shown on her xray. I give her baths every week. She has been having a big appetite after egg laying. She has been eating and drinking well but still acts lazy.

Please help me. Should I give her baytril? is it too harsh for her? or should I go to another vet? I'm wondering if there are other meds I can take as well.

Mayo lives in a 50 gallon tank, substrate is tiles, her warm side is about 105f and cold side is 91f. At night time I have a CHE and set it around 85-90f. Humidity is 25. I dont know if humidity is causing her to mouth gap but for few months her humidity was around 30-40 and her mouth was still open.

:arrow: DIAGNOSTICS

WEIGHT: 510 grams

Bile Acid test: 7.5

WBC: 18.4
RBC: .77
PCV%: 30
Buffy Coat %: 0
MCV fl: 390
HGB g/dL: 8.5
MCHC g/dl: 28.3
HCT Plasma/Serum Condition: Normal

 

[EllenD]

Okay, first of all, your Dragon has unfortunately been completely over-medicated by all of these vets, she should have never been given ANY of these Antibiotics at all, they were given for absolutely no reason. This is an extremely common problem with "Exotics" vets, they very often give Antibiotics without doing any diagnostic testing at all, either "Just in case" or because they don't have any other answer for the owner, so they just give them an Antibiotic to make the owner feel better.

Here's the problem: Bearded Dragons, as well as other reptiles, cannot handle all of these medications, they are all extremely harsh on their kidneys and livers, and it honestly sounds like you've gotten off lucky as your dragon has not yet lost her appetite or become lethargic from all of these totally unnecessary Antibiotics. That's usually not the case, we've actually had 2 dragons that were perfectly healthy die of renal failure due to unnecessary Antibiotics and Anti-parasitic meds this past month. So no, she does not need the Baytril, get rid of it now, do not give it to her, and do not allow her to have ANY OTHER medications again without a diagnostic test, like a Culture and Sensitivity or Blood Cell Count showing that she actually has an infection that requires treatment, and without the Culture showing exactly what bacteria and/or fungi is causing the specific infection, and exactly what medication will be effective against that specific microbe. Otherwise you're just pissing in the wind, pardon my language, but that's exactly what all of these damn Exotics vets are doing, and it's literally killing healthy Dragons.

Your Dragon does not have an URI, it doesn't at all sound like she has anything wrong with her at all, she sounds perfectly healthy. She has not lost her appetite, she has not become lethargic, she has not been wheezing, not coughing, not making "clicking" noises when she breathes. Her blood work is perfect. If she had ANY bacterial and/or fungal infections at all, her Blood Counts would have shown it. You're very fortunate that all the meds have not caused any kidney function issues, but they haven't as of right now. So no, she has no Respiratory Infection at all, rather everything you're describing and everything you're worrying about is just regular, normal, every day Bearded Dragon behavior. The very sad thing is that not one of these "Exotics" Vets told you this. I'm going to guess that none of them asked you any questions about your husbandry at all either, specifically what UVB light you have, what type of thermometer you use, and what the temperatures of the 3 zones inside her tank/enclosure are, etc.

First of all, the "Mouth Gaping" that you're describing is the completely normal way that they regulate their body temperature! All Dragons mouth-gape in order to regulate their body temps while basking under their lights. This is not at all an indication of an infection, the only way this behavior would be abnormal is if she WASN'T doing it.

They also adjust/puff-out/expand their beards on a regular basis, and they do this for a number of different, normal reasons. They do it when they are going through a shed, in order to loosen their skin. They do it after they eat or drink anything, to help chew/swallow/digest their food. And they all often store food and/or water inside their beards directly after they eat, they save it for later. So you'll see them making the motions you're describing when they're storing the food/water, and then again when they decide to finally eat or drink it. There are also some behavioral things they do with their beards, usually associated with either hormones, for instance if they see their own reflections in the glass of their tanks. So all of the beard behavior you're describing is also normal.

She's also been making/laying clutches of infertile eggs, and this can also obviously cause hormonal behaviors to be displayed, such as flaring their beards. And it's good that you're feeding her more protein and giving her more calcium before, during, and after she lays these clutches.

i'm sorry you've been through all of this, it's quite obvious that you care very much for your Dragon, and you're more than welcome to post some photos of her and her enclosure/tank and let us know what type of UVB light you have, what her temperature zones are, etc. so we can see if you have any husbandry issues, but honestly it sounds like you have, and have always had a perfectly normal, healthy Bearded Dragon, and these vets that you took her too did correctly tell you that she has no infections, illnesses, disease processes, etc. going on, I only wish that would not have medicated her for no reasons at all. You have no idea how lucky you are that she did not become seriously ill from all of the medications she was given, especially multiple injections of Cephz, which were so totally unnecessary I can't believe a vet would do that to you or to her. The other thing you need to realize is that Dragons do not handle stress in-general well, and stress is often turned into serious, physical health problems in Dragons. So every time you take her to the vet it can cause her to become extremely stressed, just the trip alone, let alone getting injections, blood drawn, etc. Now obviously these things are necessary sometimes, and that's fine, but your dragon is perfectly healthy and has not one thing wrong with her, so all of this was totally just unnecessary, and these vets know that...it's infuriating, and it's becoming a real issue....

So please relax and be happy, she's perfectly fine, no infections, no illnesses or disease process at all, she's got a great appetite, is active, alert, and happy. Throw out the Baytril and please, please do not give her any more medications at all, because you've been lucky thus far, but eventually that will catch-up with her...As I said, we're happy to look over your husbandry if you like, just to make sure everything is okay, but you have a perfectly healthy, happy, normally behaved Dragon...

 

[Mayonaise]

Thanks so much EllenD!!,

Your reply was so helpful!! I've only had her in my care for about a year and grew so fond of her and I love her dearly. I know I have still a lot to learn because she is my first bearded dragon. She is about 5 years old. Rescued her from someone I know who wasn't taking care of her well most of her life. She was fed only romaine lettuce her whole life :shock:. She was so skinny when I first got her but have since gotten chubbier and eating well. When I first got her she only had newspapers in her tank and nothing to climb on etc. She was laying flat most her life so her nails were outgrown and crooked. So she has trouble climbing and walks a lil awkward. Her nails sometimes scratches her eye and she bumps into things a lot. That's why I made her setup simple and safe-proof lol. :lol:

This is her setup at the moment. Not much going on. I have tiles for her substrate. She has a "Zoo Med Repti Sun 10.0 UVB" hood, two uvb 100watt on the dual lamps, and the left one I use for her CHE at night because it gets cold here during the winter. At night I switch the whole ramp thing to the left side so the CHE can reach her. Do you recommend I add some more stuff? I'm kinda scared of her scratching her eye from wood etc but I don't know.

Here is her photo