Toothless eye

acidburn01

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Beardie name(s)
Toothless
@acidburn01
Heya ๐Ÿ™‚ was just wandering how Toothless is doing, I haven't seen an update and am worrying about him. I hope all is well. ๐Ÿ™‚
Well, we assumed he's doing okay. He's eating a little, seemingly more alert, wants to sorta run and headbob at the girls. We take him back to uga tomorrow for his echo. We had a long talk with the uga vet and his regular vet and they said toothless has to have the gallbladder surgery and it can help his liver significantly. The downside is we have a few options. One being we don't do surgery, because he isn't/wont metabolizing the anesthesia meds and while he isn't feeling well and hurting, wait for his gallbladder or liver to kill him. Or two, based on if his echo is okay, we do the gallbladder surgery and he either doesn't wake up from the anesthesia or he does wake up and either pulls through those critical first 72 hours and we start the path of healing or he wakes up but has some other complications within the first 72 hours. So, it's mostly a lose-lose situation and we were told to basically be prepared to not come home with Toothless this week. ๐Ÿ˜”๐Ÿ˜”
 

acidburn01

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Beardie name(s)
Toothless
Hello,

Poor guy! How is he doing this evening, still more alert I hope?
Did they have any suggestions on how to treat his gall stones, medication or supplementation/diet?
You could try using some black or tart cherry juice to help with renal function & just overall cleaning
the blood, etc. I can try to do some research for you, regarding gall stones, etc. I just noticed, what
medication did the vet give for the gall stones?
As far as heart issues, they could give a diuretic possibly. Dandelion root is very good for help as
diuretic activity.
Please keep us posted on his condition.

Tracie
Hey, sorry for some reason, I wasn't getting notifications for comments. But these are the meds they gave him. The ursodiol is for his gallbladder, to hopefully breakup the stones and move bile through it, the other as a liver protectant and then his pain meds. Here is a screenshot of his meds and dosage. I'm gonna post a link of his discharge paperwork once it uploads to my drive, if you wanna look through it.

We talked on the phone with both vets for over an hour. If his echo is good, they'll wanna do surgery to take out the gallbladder. But because of his liver function, (despite that removing the gallbladder will improve his liver function) he isn't working through the anesthesia so he's at a high risk of not waking up and/or waking up but having a complication in those first critical 72 hours after surgery. So, ultimately, they said to prepare ourselves to possibly not come home with Toothless this weekend. And even thinking about that makes me feel like I can't breathe.
 

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xp29

BD.org Addict
Photo Comp Winner
Beardie name(s)
Ruby, Sinatra, Zsa Zsa
Well, we assumed he's doing okay. He's eating a little, seemingly more alert, wants to sorta run and headbob at the girls. We take him back to uga tomorrow for his echo. We had a long talk with the uga vet and his regular vet and they said toothless has to have the gallbladder surgery and it can help his liver significantly. The downside is we have a few options. One being we don't do surgery, because he isn't/wont metabolizing the anesthesia meds and while he isn't feeling well and hurting, wait for his gallbladder or liver to kill him. Or two, based on if his echo is okay, we do the gallbladder surgery and he either doesn't wake up from the anesthesia or he does wake up and either pulls through those critical first 72 hours and we start the path of healing or he wakes up but has some other complications within the first 72 hours. So, it's mostly a lose-lose situation and we were told to basically be prepared to not come home with Toothless this week. ๐Ÿ˜”๐Ÿ˜”
That's horrible ๐Ÿ˜ž ๐Ÿ˜ข
He is a tough lil guy though so I'm going to believe he can pull through!!! You guys are on top of everything all the time so I'm hoping this was caught in time to save him. My heart is absolutely breaking for you guys and Toothless to ๐Ÿ˜”
 

acidburn01

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Beardie name(s)
Toothless
That's horrible ๐Ÿ˜ž ๐Ÿ˜ข
He is a tough lil guy though so I'm going to believe he can pull through!!! You guys are on top of everything all the time so I'm hoping this was caught in time to save him. My heart is absolutely breaking for you guys and Toothless to ๐Ÿ˜”
We talked to the uga vet for a good while and while she agrees with some stuff our vet said, not everything. She said he does have several serious things going on and we cant wait until he looses the 300g, but she also doesn't believe it's a "get to surgery or you'll die" emergency and is comfortable in his stability (depending on how stable he is today upon examination) to wait a week or two before surgery, if we wanted. She said right now, he has about an 80/20% chance, which is only 10% more than what Nova faced with her spay. Which, I guess, is a bit comforting.

So, we're heading to uga for his echo and to see if he is a candidate for anesthesia and if he does have surgery, it'll prolly be tomorrow/this weekend and then they'll do a liver biopsy to determine the severity and if it's fatty liver or some other liver disease and we will also discuss an esophageal feeding tube. She said it sticks out of his neck and goes down his throat and straight into his stomach, that she's done a bunch and its been real successful and other beardie owners have been greatful to have it when their lizard is sick and won't eat.

He's still trucking along, he ran around the floor a bit yesterday, headbobbed a bunch and I even took him outside to sit in the grass. He's not too thrilled to be up so early and in the car, but then again, that's pretty much Toothless.
 

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xp29

BD.org Addict
Photo Comp Winner
Beardie name(s)
Ruby, Sinatra, Zsa Zsa
We talked to the uga vet for a good while and while she agrees with some stuff our vet said, not everything. She said he does have several serious things going on and we cant wait until he looses the 300g, but she also doesn't believe it's a "get to surgery or you'll die" emergency and is comfortable in his stability (depending on how stable he is today upon examination) to wait a week or two before surgery, if we wanted. She said right now, he has about an 80/20% chance, which is only 10% more than what Nova faced with her spay. Which, I guess, is a bit comforting.

So, we're heading to uga for his echo and to see if he is a candidate for anesthesia and if he does have surgery, it'll prolly be tomorrow/this weekend and then they'll do a liver biopsy to determine the severity and if it's fatty liver or some other liver disease and we will also discuss an esophageal feeding tube. She said it sticks out of his neck and goes down his throat and straight into his stomach, that she's done a bunch and its been real successful and other beardie owners have been greatful to have it when their lizard is sick and won't eat.

He's still trucking along, he ran around the floor a bit yesterday, headbobbed a bunch and I even took him outside to sit in the grass. He's not too thrilled to be up so early and in the car, but then again, that's pretty much Toothless.
I can see he don't feel good in the 1st picture, poor little guy. But that does sound like much better new than they had been giving you. Hopefully he is strong enough to just get all this over with so you can have your boy back to normal. I'll keep sending good vibes his way!!!
Oh btw, I love his security jacket ๐Ÿ™‚
 

AHBD

BD.org Sicko
So good to see that his eye swelling is down and he's out and about on security detail. :) I knowhe needs to lose weight but Idon't think300 grams, maybe 200.
 

acidburn01

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Beardie name(s)
Toothless
I can see he don't feel good in the 1st picture, poor little guy. But that does sound like much better new than they had been giving you. Hopefully he is strong enough to just get all this over with so you can have your boy back to normal. I'll keep sending good vibes his way!!!
Oh btw, I love his security jacket ๐Ÿ™‚
So good to see that his eye swelling is down and he's out and about on security detail. :) I knowhe needs to lose weight but Idon't think300 grams, maybe 200.
The echo is done. The left valve (i guess, the left side, at least.) of his heart is very, very enlarged and confirmed he is in heart failure, but im not sure if they know of the severity of it. Surgery is off the table for right now but still a possibility in the future. She said it looked like he had some backflow of blood (or a shunt) into his heart and that basically, what they're seeing is something they've never really seen in the way it's presenting, even the cardiologist they have is renowned, published tons of papers and studies and is like, one of *the* top reptile cardiologist says she's never seen the way his heart is doing what it's doing. Kendall said she thinks his eye bulging is related to his heart and is a little concerned that it gets worse at night, but isn't 100% on what's making it go back and forth but she is fairly certain that his liver and gallbladder is caused by his heart and thinks we can do medical management on his heart and it'll improve his other organs. She said there's is very limited research on their hearts but she's confident in the meds, however it has cut his lifespan from the average 15 to maybe another year or two with him. So.. awesome. ๐Ÿ˜’๐Ÿ˜’
 

acidburn01

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Beardie name(s)
Toothless
Well even a little improvement is something. Just do the best you can and sometimes we can be surprised by things going better than we might have heard they would.
A little improvement is better than a downward spiral, however the doc did all but confirm that his lifespan is cut significantly to just maybe a few years, if that.

We'll know more details tomorrow when we go pick him up. The upside, i guess, is he's at least trying. He tries to eat some mealworms and drinking water and he'll eat his 3-4ml of critical care so it seems like he wants to get better.
 

AHBD

BD.org Sicko
I would just bring him home and let him live his life as stress free as possible. Keep him on a non fatty diet so not many mealworms at all. A few dubia a week, medium ones, along with the bit of critical care and try to get him to eat greens. Take it 1 day at a time.
 

xp29

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Photo Comp Winner
Beardie name(s)
Ruby, Sinatra, Zsa Zsa
Their ability with medicine is getting better for them, if they are giving him a year or two maybe they will have meds by then that prolongs him even longer. I sure hope so.
 

acidburn01

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Beardie name(s)
Toothless
I would just bring him home and let him live his life as stress free as possible. Keep him on a non fatty diet so not many mealworms at all. A few dubia a week, medium ones, along with the bit of critical care and try to get him to eat greens. Take it 1 day at a time.
Their ability with medicine is getting better for them, if they are giving him a year or two maybe they will have meds by then that prolongs him even longer. I sure hope so.
We got a call and they said he's crashing and asked us to switch him to a dnr because she doesn't think they can resuscitate him. So we're trying to drive the almost 2 hour drive before he passes to at least say goodbye
 

xp29

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Photo Comp Winner
Beardie name(s)
Ruby, Sinatra, Zsa Zsa
We got a call and they said he's crashing and asked us to switch him to a dnr because she doesn't think they can resuscitate him. So we're trying to drive the almost 2 hour drive before he passes to at least say goodbye
Oh no ๐Ÿ˜” I'm so sorry to hear that news ๐Ÿ˜ช I know how much you love him. It breaks my heart you guys are having to go through this. I know words can't help but we are all here for you guys ๐Ÿซ‚
 

acidburn01

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Beardie name(s)
Toothless
Oh no ๐Ÿ˜” I'm so sorry to hear that news ๐Ÿ˜ช I know how much you love him. It breaks my heart you guys are having to go through this. I know words can't help but we are all here for you guys ๐Ÿซ‚
They brought us back to see him and he didn't really look any worse than he did when we first brought him a week ago. They have him in a little icu box on wheels, pretty much. We all took a few minutes to pet him and when I leaned down to kiss him and talk to him, he pulled himself forward, opened his eyes and lifted his head. It may have been just like a, one of those involuntary type movements but it was heart wrenching. We aren't euthanizing him, the vets don't really think he's in active pain and, like I said, he doesn't look worse than he did a week ago. But that's not to say awful ****s not going down in his body right now. If nothing else, they said he has pretty bad heart disease. They're going to keep monitoring him and if he passes, they'll call us tonight. If he doesn't, Kendall will be in in the morning and we'll go talk to her about possibilities.
 

Drache613

BD.org Sicko
Staff member
Moderator
Hello,

Oh dear, that is not great at all! Talk about stressing
you out. I didn't see the last few posts.
I am so sorry. Let us know what is going on in the
morning, & if he made it through the night.
Perhaps things will turn around, they can be
surprisingly resilient.
I have you in my thoughts & prayers.

Tracie
 
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