Argentine Black and White Can't poop

[Doug]

Hello everyone: I have a B&W about 5 years old that has not really pooped in months. I took him to several vets around the area had him X-rayed and so on and they could not find anything wrong with him. I knocked his food down to once every three days and he still was not pooping. A few weeks ago he started trying to go but nothing comes out. He struggles so hard that while he was in his pool he flipped upside down. He keeps leaning to one side. A few days ago he was out on the porch and did poop a very large solid and hard poop. Not sure how it even came out it was so big. I have given him some min oil and soaks, rubbing under his belly down to his vent but nothing he just struggles to go and nothing. Grandma had a stroke, fell and broke her hip and I am the only one able to care for her so I have not been working and can't afford to take him to a vet. Any suggestions would really be great. I don't want to lose my big buddy. Please feel free to contact me at (831) 706-7181 or [email protected] Thank You.

 

[Josh]

Hi Doug sorry to hear about this. Have you tried high fiber food like squash, pumpkin, cherries, etc?

 

[Doug]

Hi Doug sorry to hear about this. Have you tried high fiber food like squash, pumpkin, cherries, etc?

I have tried bananas and hard boiled eggs which are his favorite and he does not want to eat. I keep using a syringe and giving him small amounts of mineral but I don’t want to keep doing that because I read it can be bad for the stomach.

 

[TheBeef]

Give him an oil enema and an oil flush. If he pooped the other day I wouldn't be as worried. It means that things are starting to move in there. Impaction has a way of figuring itself out if you treat it calmly and effectively. He needs high basking temps, daily soaks (keep him in 100 degree water for an hour, he'll enjoy it). Give him enemas daily and fight it from both ends with the oil. Generally tegus get stopped up due to poor husbandry. Make sure he gets his heat, make sure he's hydrated, throw him in the tub, give him baby food and belly rubs, and everything should sort itself out pretty quickly.

 

[Doug]

Thank You for your time. I got him to the vet today. I didn't have the money for x-rays or blood work. She did give him an enema but nothing came out. She did probe him and found hard stool up in there. She gave me Lactulose which I guess is a stool softener, Geftazidime which is an antibiotic she said she is worried about infection and a prescription for Cisapride which I have to wait until Tuesday to pick up. I am a little nervous about the Cisapride. Read a lot of negative stuff on the net. I have no idea how to give an enema and am nervous about hurting him. Do you know anything about the above stuff?

 

[TheBeef]

Skip on the antibiotics. It's hard to trust antibiotic rx for reptiles. Not enough research has been done in my opinion to say that it doesn't mess up the delicate biological balance in their stomachs. I've found that antibiotics frequently lead to secondary infections due to decreased immune response in the gut when it comes to reptiles.
Enemas are not hard to do. If you have a syringe, lift him up by the tail so that his front feet are on the floor, have someone kind of hold him gently with a towel on his head. Shove a syringe filled with oil up there and squirt it in and let him go.

 

[Doug]

Heard anything about the cisapride?

 

[TheBeef]

What's the dosage?
EDIT:
I would skip on the cisapride. It won't help with an obstruction.

Get some water in him.

 

[Doug]

Not sure yet. Can't pick it up until Tuesday.

 

[Roadkill]

Do NOT skip out on the antibiotics. Yes, there hasn't been a whole lot done on their efficacy in reptiles, and yes, they are often prescribed when not really needed. However, 1)as your vet has already found out, there is a hard bolus somewhere in the GI tract - that thing moving its way out has a very good chance of abrading the intestinal walls, and 2)your vet has been "up in" in your tegu's GI tract with instruments, and as careful as they probably were, there is again a good chance that some abrasion of the intestinal wall took place. The intestines are plumb full of nastiness and bacteria, and any small lesions make it very easy for those to then enter the blood stream and can cause your tegu serious health problems, even death. There is a very, very good reason these antibiotics are being prescribed after such a procedure. Whatever you do, do NOT follow TheBeef's advice on giving an enema: it is a great method for causing harm. If you are going to give an enema, go to the pharmacist and get yourself a bottle of Fleet and some KY jelly (always use non-petroleum based lubricants when trying to insert an instrument in any orifice, a dry tool can induce tearing). The Fleet will come with a soft, rounded applicator that will readily fit within an adult tegu's cloaca. And by all means, go gentle. Be sure to have the fluid semi-warm (about 35 degrees C will be comfortable). If you clean the applicator/bottle and be careful with them, you can re-use them.
As for the cisapride, I have no real advice on it. I've never encountered it, and at the moment I don't have access to my research literature to have a look. It does indeed sound controversial.
There are a number of things you can give your tegu orally to help with gut motility. As you already know, mineral oil is highly prescribed in these scenarios. Natural fruit and plant fibres also help in gut motility, and I have used (and often prescribed) the use of fibre laxative supplements for tegus, it won't harm them.

 

[Doug]

Thank you. Can I give him the min oil along with the lactulose? I am really nervous about the whole enema thing. Right now I have been giving the antibiotic and the stool softener.

 

[TheBeef]

Do NOT skip out on the antibiotics. Yes, there hasn't been a whole lot done on their efficacy in reptiles, and yes, they are often prescribed when not really needed. However, 1)as your vet has already found out, there is a hard bolus somewhere in the GI tract - that thing moving its way out has a very good chance of abrading the intestinal walls, and 2)your vet has been "up in" in your tegu's GI tract with instruments, and as careful as they probably were, there is again a good chance that some abrasion of the intestinal wall took place. The intestines are plumb full of nastiness and bacteria, and any small lesions make it very easy for those to then enter the blood stream and can cause your tegu serious health problems, even death. There is a very, very good reason these antibiotics are being prescribed after such a procedure. Whatever you do, do NOT follow TheBeef's advice on giving an enema: it is a great method for causing harm. If you are going to give an enema, go to the pharmacist and get yourself a bottle of Fleet and some KY jelly (always use non-petroleum based lubricants when trying to insert an instrument in any orifice, a dry tool can induce tearing). The Fleet will come with a soft, rounded applicator that will readily fit within an adult tegu's cloaca. And by all means, go gentle. Be sure to have the fluid semi-warm (about 35 degrees C will be comfortable). If you clean the applicator/bottle and be careful with them, you can re-use them.
As for the cisapride, I have no real advice on it. I've never encountered it, and at the moment I don't have access to my research literature to have a look. It does indeed sound controversial.
There are a number of things you can give your tegu orally to help with gut motility. As you already know, mineral oil is highly prescribed in these scenarios. Natural fruit and plant fibres also help in gut motility, and I have used (and often prescribed) the use of fibre laxative supplements for tegus, it won't harm them.

To each their own. I've been doing enemas on my own with reptiles as necessary for years and have never had any problems, I have a large collection, health issues happen, and I am probably more well versed on reptile health than any vet within 200 miles of me. I don't understand why anyone would dump $500 into a vet visit when the vet likely is just going to google what to do. You can do it yourself and save money. I would love to hear your rational behind how enemas are a great method for causing harm... Lubing up the back end of the intestinal tract is much more effective than giving the tegu antibiotics that will just sit idly in the gut and kill off all the beneficial bacteria in there... That said, I'd still skip on the antibiotics.. especially if the tegu doesn't have an infection to begin with. I've had more problems caused by antibiotics with my herps than fixed with antibiotics. Antibiotics are known to cause gut infections in reptiles as they screw up the natural biological balance of the gut, leading to more problems down the line.
I stick by everything I said.
And 99 out of 100 times, tegu impaction is due to the environment. Wild Tegus eat everything that fits in their mouths and pass rocks, cellulose, etc without much difficulty. If you don't believe me ask the tegu rescue guys in Florida. If a tegu gets impacted in activity, it's likely because of dehydration, low temperatures, bad diet, etc. It's fixable without using those excess biological and chemical agents that those vets hand out like candy.
I've dealt with 2 tegu impactions in 2 different tegus (the impactions were my fault as I grew complacent with my husbandry). Fixing the temps, getting the humidity right, nightly tub soaks, raw eggs, baby food, and mineral oil going in both ends as well as a daily soak fixed the problem.
But I guess I should have dropped a grand and let the vet do something that I'm just as qualified to do myself...

 

[Roadkill]

I don't understand why anyone would dump $500 into a vet visit when the vet likely is just going to google what to do. You can do it yourself and save money.

For several reasons:
1) depending on what exactly you are doing and how laws are worded in your particular region, this avenue of action could be illegal
2) if the veterinarian is appropriately qualified, then they should also have the appropriate equipment.
I don't recommend people take their reptile pets to just any veterinarian, I always stress to find a qualified one. If the kind of vet you are taking your pets to have to google what they're doing, then you haven't met your responsibility and ensured you're seeing the appropriate professional.

I would love to hear your rational behind how enemas are a great method for causing harm... Lubing up the back end of the intestinal tract is much more effective than giving the tegu antibiotics that will just sit idly in the gut and kill off all the beneficial bacteria in there...

First off, not using an appropriate lubricant, or any lubricant for that matter. The friction from inserting a "dry" instrument can cause tearing of the delicate intestinal lining. Your instructions on the matter were:

If you have a syringe, lift him up by the tail so that his front feet are on the floor, have someone kind of hold him gently with a towel on his head. Shove a syringe filled with oil up there and squirt it in and let him go.

makes no mention of lubricant, instead says to "shove" a dry instrument up and THEN squirt in oil.
Secondly, syringes in general have hard edges and ridges, you've made no mention what type of syringe or size. While those edges may not seem sharp to you, they're hard enough and have enough of an edge that it is quite possible to bruise or even cut soft, delicate tissue, particularly when used without lubricant. However, please don't take my word for it. Do me a favor, before you try your technique on any other animal, try it on yourself.
Thirdly, is the matter of tegu anatomy. They have a cloaca, which is essentially a common receptacle for a number of "outlets" of the tegu's interal organ systems. Depending on the conditions and the instrument used, someone unfamiliar with what they're doing, using an improper sized instrument can enter one of those other areas and depending on which one, can cause serious damage.

You also apparently have overlooked the fact that the veterinarian had already done a procedure. That procedure may have caused some lesions and bleeding internally. While the gut flora is good IN the gut, it is another matter if it can get into the blood stream. The reason for the antibiotics is to prevent this from happening, not trying to deal with an infection after it has taken hold as your post would suggest.

You're possibly also unfamiliar with the fact that regular usage of mineral oil as a laxative can have its own negative consequences.

You're correct that often there are veterinarians promoting antibiotics that are unnecessary or not fully understood. However, to consider all veterinarians as such only shows an arrogance that is as dangerous as seeing an inexperienced, unqualified veterinarian. Before one discounts all antibiotics and veterinary practices, it helps to try understanding their use in the first place.

As for believing you or the tegu rescue guys in Florida, thankfully I have enough of my own experience to not need to rely on those sources of information.

But I guess I should have dropped a grand and let the vet do something that I'm just as qualified to do myself...

Going by what you've posted, I'm sorry, but you clearly are not qualified.

 

[TheBeef]

We'll have to agree to disagree on the matter.

I grow bored with this dumb argument.
I will continue to use my effective care taking techniques, and you will continue to use yours. I will continue to advise people in the things that have worked for me. You may fight me every step of the way if you so choose.

 

[Doug]

I have had several people tell me to do the enema and at this point it's my only real option. I can't find the tube that everyone suggests. Can anyone suggest where I can get the equipment needed? Thanks

 

[Roadkill]

Go to the pharmacy and ask them for enema product.

 

[Doug]

I looked but didn't think they were long enough. What type of solution should I make? Somewhere I read 2 teaspoons of pure sea salt and warm distilled water.