Rescue ~6 month old veiled with MBD, need advice.

I would see what they have at the home improvement stores. They have all different kinds of tubing and things that might work for this. I love to just walk around in those stores and look for a solution to a problem, I usually find it in the place I least expected, like an old amusement park souvenir cup. :D
 
Kerbie said:
I would see what they have at the home improvement stores. They have all different kinds of tubing and things that might work for this. I love to just walk around in those stores and look for a solution to a problem, I usually find it in the place I least expected, like an old amusement park souvenir cup. :D
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Hehe. Good idea. :) I will definitely have to look around, ill let you know what i find! I think i might go search around tomorrow
 
I fill in sometimes at a store with kitchen supplies/gadgets and we sell reusable drinking straws that are exactly like what she used and you can get them in all kinds of pretty colors LOL.

I just think this is an awesome idea and wish I'd have thought of it for Twister. Waaaaaay easier than splints and wrappings!!!
 
i consider myself to be a pretty tough guy but i have a soft spot for these guys. Thank you for giving him a chance and its sad he needs but the splints..too cute:D
 
Just a quick note regarding straw use. Yes they can certainly be very effective although you need to watch the edges very carefully to make sure they are not abrading skin where they meet, and the other thing that I would recommend doing is when it is actually around his leg, run a miniscule bead of crazy glue through the cut area to properly seal it. otherwise every time he moves there is still going to be a very small motion in the straw of opening and closing, perhaps even less than 1 mm. But of course the purpose of a cast is complete immobility. So you will get faster healing times by really sealing the straw shut.

Mark Mitchell, my mentor and one of the best reptile veterinarians in the world showed me the perfect way to immobilize a broken leg (simple fracture) using a fast and sterile technique but with the strength of putting a true bone pin in the fracture. This must be done with x-rays to identify the type of fracture, assure proper placement and to make sure the bone is fixated properly, so this is not for home use! but what we will do is anesthetize the lizard, manipulate the bone into its proper position, and then use whatever length and gauge hypodermic needle that I need to insert through the stifle/hip/shoulder/elbow joints and through the medulla of the bone until it is acting just like an internal fixator or bone pin. And then you just clip off the excess outside the skin and voilà! You've got yourself a pinned bone with a perfectly sterile SS needle, and it can either remain there forever or be removed in the future if need be. much better than open surgery and placement as we would typically do on a larger reptile or mammal!

dr. o—
 
Dr. O, First of all I wanted to thank you for all of your help. I will give the doctor I work for this information and see if it might be something he would be willing to attempt.

The straws have been working very well except for one spot. I think the humerus of one arm may have been fractured a while before I got him and maybe it started healing on its own before the splint could be applied. I occasionally take the splints off to check for sores and make sure they are not too tight. Most of the bones seem to be much straighter except for the left humerus. He has a small sore on the back of his arm that I can only assume is from the pressure of the splint on the fracture.

My question is what to do next if the bone is already healing incorrectly? Should the bone be re-broken and then splinted or pinned correctly or is there nothing that can be done?
 
I have another question for Dr. O: what about taping the straw shut? Would it still be a "pinch" risk? I'm just thinking that would make it easier to remove, because eventually you're going to want to remove it....
 
Kerbie said:
My question is what to do next if the bone is already healing incorrectly? Should the bone be re-broken and then splinted or pinned correctly or is there nothing that can be done?
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basically that's something that would never be done in any reptile situations that i can think of. if the bone is stablized and nutrition is good it will bond however it can and that's all that matters. even in people bones are generally only rebroken for cosmetic reasons, and maybe with a dog or cat if it was casuing a joint to malfunction or something. but a long bone with a bump or turn in it is unlikely to cause any long-term issues, and the ladies will still love him for it.
 
Elizadolots said:
I have another question for Dr. O: what about taping the straw shut? Would it still be a "pinch" risk? I'm just thinking that would make it easier to remove, because eventually you're going to want to remove it....
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i think that would be fine. honestly i've wound up pinning or bandaging 99% of what i do since they work much better, heal quicker, and i can charge more for a modified Robert Jones bandage than i can for a MickeyD's straw....... ;-)

when i've seen this technique done, there's all sorts of tube-like things that someone can use for the technique. and most are just easiest to close w/ krazy glue so that's what came to mind.
 
For everyone that is following this thread and anyone that has found themselves in a similar situation I wanted to recommend http://www.reptileuv.com. When I needed to buy one of there high uvb output bulbs for Gumby, almost all of their products were on back order due to high demand for an awesome product. I sent an email to their contact us link asking if it would be possible for me to be added to an urgent case waiting list and sent them a link to this thread. 12 hours later they responded by saying to purchase the bulb and it would be shipped immediately.

I am so glad that there is an occasional american company that has not lost sight of it's original goal and purpose. The contact page also lists the company owner and man who invented their product's personal phone number to call "anytime day or night" if you need help with a sick reptile. So impressed by them and really thought I should share.
 
Progress Report = Awesomeness

:D Hooray! :D After only 3 weeks we managed to grow Gumby some bones! Still not perfect by any means but so much better than before. Now if I could only get the little man to eat something on his own. hrmph. ;)

292184_4099999258803_1991838934_n.jpg
 
Amazing! Congrats on the great progress you are making!

Hope things just keep getting better like they are so far. :)
 
He Finally Ate on His Own!

Yep! Yesterday for the first time, he finally ate 4 butter worms on his own. I had been hand feeding him everyday for almost 2 months and started to wonder if I was feeding him so much that he had no desire to eat on his own. It took about a week of tough love and having to fight the urge to pull him out and make him eat something but yesterday i put 6 butter worms in with him and when I came home there were only 2 left.

I still have no idea if his tongue works or if he went and picked them out of the bowl with his mouth but at this point I don't even care. HE ATE! Hooray. It can be done. This was the last hurdle that we had to get over and we finally made it. I hope that this thread can help many people in the future and give hope to those of you who find yourself in a similar situation. If you are willing to put in a lot of time and effort you can turn around even severe cases of MBD and help a chameleon live a relatively healthy and happy life.

Thank you to all of you who offered encouragement and advice as I had no idea what I was doing when I took this little guy in a few months back.
 
That's so great....we should archive all the success stories in one place so we can refer people with new problems to them. This definitely belongs in the "educational and inspirational" file!
 
i'm so happy for you and Gumby, Kerbie. you really did an outstanding job from moment one.

did you wind up using calcitonin?
 
Dr. O,

I did manage to get a vial of calcitonin (that stuff is expensive, geez) and Gumby got an injection once a week for 3 weeks. I am sure it helped but from the radiographs his bone density seemed to be mostly improved in the 3 or 4 weeks before the injections began.
 
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