Terrible edema...someone help???

[christineacero]

So Zuri looked like her edema had reduced a bit a few days ago and it seems to have came back with a vengeance! The intense swelling is extremely concerning and I have absolutely no idea what to do to reduce it. Please, anyone who has successfully reduced swelling edema in chams, I could REALLY use the advice!! Also, any vets wanna chime in??

 

[ferretinmyshoes]

I've investigated gular edema as thoroughly as I can without actually being in a lab setting and running blood vitamin levels. There is limited information on it and still a lot of unknown. While it is typically gular edema there is a small chance it could be infection of the more cranial air sac projections of the lungs found in that location. Usually accompanied by respiratory signs. And some females get transient edema only when they're gravid - you're sure she's not gravid? With gular edema fat soluble vitamins like A and D are the most likely culprits by far based on my experience. Just like with people with edema there is a concern for liver or kidney dysfunction causing fluid imbalance but in the ones I've done bloodwork on there were no abnormalities to correlate it with organ dysfunction. Vitamin D chronic overdose can cause damage to the kidneys, which is well documented in iguanas.

I believe mine were caused by vitamin A in the several chams I've had get it. It was transient in mine after the inadvertent addition of high levels of vitamin A (trying to use up extra parrot pellets), however as you know correlation does not necessarily equal causation. There is an ongoing debate on whether or not chameleons can utilize beta carotene and other VitA precursors, or if they need preformed vit A. It's still an unknown.

Regardless, the most success that I and several others have had is lots of natural sunlight, keeping them very well hydrated to help flush everything out faster, continuing high calcium/low phosphorus supplementation to support good kidney health, and stop any multivitamin supplementation for several months. If you are gutloading well then you do not have to worry about nutritional deficits from not using a multivitamin. After a few weeks two of mine's edema cleared up and for the worst one of mine it took nearly 6 months and it came back a few times but not as severe. He now has gout so even though his kidney values are still normal I do suspect some kidney problems that could have caused the edema a few years ago. Won't know until he passes on and I do a necropsy with histopath but that's my speculation. Carol had a cham that came to her with severe edema and his never went away despite the same approach I took. He happened to have gout at the end as well. There is still much to learn...

As long as she is acting fine and it does not seem to be bothering her I wouldn't worry too much about fluctuations because that is kind of par for the course with edema it seems. There is really no way to reduce quickly it short of having it drained by a vet, but it will fill back up again and sometimes within 24 hours. I've tried it.

 

[melble68]

Reply w/ your feeder types, feeding schedule, supplement schedule, and brand and type of supplements.

I changed my type of daily calcium w/ zero D3, and my panther's cleared up in a few weeks. I used Repti Calcium without D3 for the first few months I had him, and his pits and chest were becoming noticeably swelled. Read as much as I could from other members past threads, and came across one mentioning that not all vendors that say there is no D3 isn't quite all its wrapped up to be. I switched to what they recommended to work for their situation, and we're much better. Tues thru Sunday, Luke now gets his assorted feeders dusted w/ REP-CAL Calcium No Phosphorous No Vitamin D3.

 

[Mike Fisher]

I recently got a gravid female chameleon that had edema so bad that she looked round like a balloon, had no coordination/grip. It was determined that she had hypovitaminosis of A and D. Within two days of heavy dusting feeders with a vitamin powder, all signs of edema were gone.

In a week she had enough strength and coordination back to dig her tunnel and lay fertile eggs.

I would not try that treatment without blood work in the instance that it is suffering from hypervitaminosis because you'll make it worse. Just wanting to point out that edema can be caused by not enough vitamins too.

 

[pigglett79]

My panther George has had bad gular edema for about a year now. His is so severe that his whole neck area is huge like a balloon. It does seem to reduce a little and fill up more other days. We have tried everything. His blood work and fecals are normal. I have tried washing off all vitamins, changing gutload, changing calcium, switching to RO water, nothing helps at all. He gets tons of sunshine as well.

I'm always on the look out for anything anyone finds that helps the edema. George acts normal and it doesn't seem to bother him, but it's a real mystery. I hope to find out some answers years from now when he passes and we get a necropsy done.

 

[Mike Fisher]

I have tried washing off all vitamins, changing gutload, changing calcium, switching to RO water, nothing helps at all.
I'm always on the look out for anything anyone finds that helps the edema.

Have you tried a few days of a multi vitamin? He might not be getting enough. I've always dosed with multivitamin on a regular basis and I've never had a cham develop edema. I've bought quite a few that I was able to clear up though.

My personal opinion is that we give too much credit to UV light bulbs and gut loading to keep them healthy and as a hobby we've been using too little supplementation out of fear. Their diet in captivity is too limited to make up for it by gut loading alone.

 

[christineacero]

I've noticed that her RI has returned today, she's coughing a lot. So I'm going to take ferretinmyshoes advice and she's got a vet appointment on Tuesday. I'm wondering if it's not an RI and that it's something else since apparently the baytril did absolutely nothing besides stress the heck out of her and lose her trust in me.

 

[Cait0420]

Hope all goes well at the vet! Keep us updated on how she's doing.

 

[Hoj]

whenever I have had a cham suffering form edema I stop all vit d and multivitamin suppelementation and use plain calcium every other day.
that combined with a lot of extra mistings and showers and some natural sunlight and the results are usually positive
it could help if we knew more about your suppelement schedual and types used.

 

[ferretinmyshoes]

If she's having respiratory signs then it could definitely be more than just edema. A vet visit is a very good idea, and probably a better antibiotic than baytril.