Nicky
01-13-06, 02:20 PM
Today when I brought my bp in to one of the few, knowledgeable exotic vets in my area for a suspected respiratory infection ( she had very soft raspy/bubbly breathing for the last few weeks and had been losing weight rapidly over the last month and a half) to get some antibiotics the vet made a surprising find. After doing a general check over and affirming it was a mild infection she gave me some oral meds for 3 weeks.
Before leaving she just wanted to do a quick ultrasonic test to listen to his breathing and heart to see if it was all in check. The breathing checked out fine besides being a bit raspy. However after 20 mins of trying to search for her heart beat, ( which she found very unusually as normally the heart is very easy to locate in snakes) she stumbled upon a very weak sloshing sound. After a few minutes of listening to this faint noise, she looked shocked and told me that this very whisper of a beat was her heart. She told me that a normal heart beat in a snake ( the machine has just been used 20 mins early on another ball and was functioning normally) is usually much louder, stronger and a distinct pounding clear noise then the low sloshing sound we heard. She said she wasn't 100% sure because theirs still a lot unknown in the reptile veterinary field but she suspected that she may have a heart defect or heart murmur of some sort and was unsure of how it would affect her in the future.
I've never heard of any such cases in snakes let alone bp's, has anyone every else heard of such a thing and how it affects their life span? Needless to say to be safe I won't be breeding her in the future encase she does have a defect as I wouldn't want to pass on the disorder to her offspring, nor put the extra stress on her. She said to keep on weighing her monthly and after the resp. infection clears up to bring her back for more tests. I would go to another herp vet for a second opinion but frankly the other 2 places I've gone to in the past were completely useless.
I really hope she pulls through and can still live a reasonably long life without any pain. I've had her for 3 years now and have always been in love with these snakes that I would really hate to lose her so young.
Any comments or thoughts on the issue would be greatly appreciated alone with any advice on how to proceed.
Thanks A lot
Kayla Young
Before leaving she just wanted to do a quick ultrasonic test to listen to his breathing and heart to see if it was all in check. The breathing checked out fine besides being a bit raspy. However after 20 mins of trying to search for her heart beat, ( which she found very unusually as normally the heart is very easy to locate in snakes) she stumbled upon a very weak sloshing sound. After a few minutes of listening to this faint noise, she looked shocked and told me that this very whisper of a beat was her heart. She told me that a normal heart beat in a snake ( the machine has just been used 20 mins early on another ball and was functioning normally) is usually much louder, stronger and a distinct pounding clear noise then the low sloshing sound we heard. She said she wasn't 100% sure because theirs still a lot unknown in the reptile veterinary field but she suspected that she may have a heart defect or heart murmur of some sort and was unsure of how it would affect her in the future.
I've never heard of any such cases in snakes let alone bp's, has anyone every else heard of such a thing and how it affects their life span? Needless to say to be safe I won't be breeding her in the future encase she does have a defect as I wouldn't want to pass on the disorder to her offspring, nor put the extra stress on her. She said to keep on weighing her monthly and after the resp. infection clears up to bring her back for more tests. I would go to another herp vet for a second opinion but frankly the other 2 places I've gone to in the past were completely useless.
I really hope she pulls through and can still live a reasonably long life without any pain. I've had her for 3 years now and have always been in love with these snakes that I would really hate to lose her so young.
Any comments or thoughts on the issue would be greatly appreciated alone with any advice on how to proceed.
Thanks A lot
Kayla Young