Pierpont-Fistula and Injury

[feralpigeon]

Wow, Pidgey, what a difference. He looks great and hopefully will be fine in a short while. Can't believe the price difference. Forty-five bucks, unreal. Maybe we should start shipping to you....just kidding

[Lady Tarheel]

Pidgey, you're "da man". I'm pulling for Pierpoint. Just got back from the vet myself - took Mr. Humphries (with the two broken legs and claw foot). This morning when we were feeding him we noticed blood on the counter. His knee joint (where the bandaged foot was) had what looked like a piece of skin torn almost off. The vet said it was a pressure sore, much like a bedsore, because he has been so confined for the past 4 weeks. Said he needed a "fluffy" bed to reduce the pressure when he is laying down. Said tear up a lot of newspaper and put that in his bed. I did that and tore up a lot of tissues too and the little rascal jumped right in there. She did take his foot bandage off and his foot looks straight. But, she also said he could be released next week! The poor little guy still can't stand up straight and is being one stubborn little thing in learning how to eat. Anyhow, we're going to keep him a few months longer to make sure he's ok.

I had never heard of the newspaper bit for pressure sores so thought I'd share that info.

Take care.

[Pidgey]

Lady Tarheel,

I usually put them on a towel when they're too busted up to stand although I got one in with a shattered wing yesterday and had to "southern engineer" another way around it.

I tried that broken wing wrap that is shown on one of the links in here but I couldn't get it to thrust the wing forward enough to give the bird a chance to gain wing function back. I seriously doubt that he'll ever fly again because the radius and ulna are both involved but I've got him stabilized now in such a way that if it can heal--it'll heal in the right position, I think.

If you looked over the top, you'd see that the broken side didn't project as far forward (with wings folded) by a long shot so it's important to get them where they will. Otherwise, the fragments won't have a chance to knit separately so articulation of the distal joint (wrist) is compromised.

I know if I took him to the vet, they'd X-Ray and faint. The muscle is very bruised and that's got to go down as well. He may end up like Mr. Squeaks but I sure hope not. He's a banded homer with a Jedds band so they'll tell me who the owner is in a day or so.

Anyhow, because I couldn't get him walking properly without the bandage getting messed up, I made him an impromptu sling. I'll upload a picture here in a little bit and edit this post to include the link. I tried to make it extremely comfortable with no pressure points, certainly none on the feet (haha!).





Pidgey

[Trees Gray]

Pidgey,

In regard to Pierpoint: As usual, great job! I love the education I'm getting from your posts.

The post-op picture of him: Ouch, that does look like it hurt, but it looks so much better then before.

Does Pierpoint have a chance at being released back to he wild when he has healed?


Treesa

[Pidgey]

Treesa,

You betcha'! That little scamp COMPLAINS about EVERYTHING. You don't even get in the same room with him that you don't hear: "GRUNT! GRUNT! GRUNT!"

If you "freeze" and don't move, he'll shut up. Bat an eyelid, though, and "GRUNT! GRUNT! GRUNT!"

I swear, he'd complain if'n he were hung with a new rope! Realistically, if I keep him too long, I'll have to "soft-release" him when the time finally comes. His feathers are going to have to grow back and his other feathers are messed up so I really ought to keep him until they're molted out--that shouldn't be but about... two months?

But I think he'll probably be a fully functional bird in awhile. I guess we'll have to see how well that breast muscle performs. It was seriously degraded but he's also a very small pigeon anyway so they've usually got a heckuva' thrust-to-weight ratio and, therefore, have plenty to spare. He's certainly got the "inner fortitude" to survive on his own.

Pidgey

[cyro51]

Did you consider the lady's hose/sock idea put forward a few days ago? That works gently to keep everything in place.

My vet bandaged up a pigeon with a broken wing so tight it just lay in a miserable heap . The person that brought it to me considered asking for it to be euthanased rather than have it in such an unhappy situation for any length of time. The elaborate bandaging was done, apparently, because the pigeon (Suki) got the bandage off. When I received Suki I replaced all the bandages with a single band of micropore to immobilise the wing, that worked very well and when John took her back to the vet for an examination the vet agreed it did the job. If it had needed additional support then I would have done the pantyhose thing.

They take a couple of hours to adjust their balance to being bandaged.

The sock also works well as a harness, as the Braveheart story (and photo) shows. http://www.redroselofts.com/braveheart.htm

Cynthia

[Pidgey]

Cynthia,

Yeah, I tried that but I couldn't get the symmetry to work out properly. One of my vets told me with my last bird that had a broken wing was that the prognosis is pretty good if they only break one bone in that section (either the radius or ulna) but not when they break both. That's pretty bad.

What happens is that all of the muscles around the two bones tend to spasm/contract and slowly draw the bone fragments together, I guess. When that happens, it's tough for them (the two bones) to remain separate from each other in the healing process. If they join, then the distal joint (wrist) will not be able to swing outward. My vet showed me that the (post-healing) test was if you can pull the wing outward and the tip feathers extend to a reasonable amount of their normal extension.

When I tried the various ways of stabilizing this bird's wing in the folded position, you could see from above that the forward curvature that they were not symmetrical by a significant amount. This was due to the "collapse" of the section with the broken radius and ulna. So, I ended up with a version that has a tape loop from around the entire broken wing to the forward edge of the good wing to provide a slight forward traction. Also, I taped around both wings and tail with a 3/4" wide piece of masking tape to help thrust the wrist forward. By these two points of "traction," I'm hoping to keep the fragments in line enough to heal separately.

Will it all work? Hell if I know, but we'll see how bad it is in two weeks. I'm pretty sure that it's not too tight but it is extremely immobilized, mostly by way of tape rigidity. The thing that I'm mostly worried about is the blood supply to the wingtip tissues but there's very little to be done about that but wait and see.

Pidgey

[Trees Gray]

Originally Posted by Pidgey

But I think he'll probably be a fully functional bird in awhile. I guess we'll have to see how well that breast muscle performs. It was seriously degraded but he's also a very small pigeon anyway so they've usually got a helluva' thrust-to-weight ratio and, therefore, have plenty to spare. He's certainly got the "inner fortitude" to survive on his own.
Pidgey

I'm glad to hear that the bird is grunting away, great sign! He definitely is fighting to live, especially since you mentioned that he is barely grown up.

Now, I'm going to explain the growth, not to be a smart ***, but just for your information:

If the injury has been going on for more then two weeks, then the reason he is a small pigeon may be because an injury of this magnatude compromised his growth. He may still have been in the growth spurt when injured. It took everything he had to try to rebuild and heal cells, when at the same time he may have been trying to lay down new growth cells. Pierpoint couldn't do both, at the same time, he only had enough energy to try to attempt healing, so his maximum growth wasn't achieved. Given his condition and maybe substandard food, it makes sense.

Now that he is in your capable hands he will do well! If you had gotten him a few weeks ago, and was able to provide him with healing help, and good food, he would have reached his full size. I know that is neither here nor there....just an explanation, I'm just glad he found you when he did!

Treesa

[Pidgey]

Yeah, I've wondered about that. There's no way of knowing how old he is except that those feathers on top of his head have those funny colored edges that I've never seen in an adult pigeon. The vet didn't think that the injury was much more than a week old, which surprised me because the fistula looked like it had been there forever.

I also found this morning (his first fecal) that he's got a slight case of roundworms as well as some coccidia so the poor fellow has REALLY had a bad month! He's definitely had to channel a lot of resources towards survival instead of growing.

I also see now that he's been so used to drinking more than the normal amount of water to get enough down that now he's got a drinking problem! I'm going to have to start rationing it to him to get him normalized. It's got Baytril in it so he really needs to moderate it. I guess I'm going to have to get him to AA.

Pidgey

[Trees Gray]

Poor baby, he does have a lot of issues, and that is the norm when a bird is stressed.

If he is still a "drinking fool" then he is still dehydrated and trying like all get-out to replenish the loss of fluids in his tissues and organs.

There are several homeopathic products for severe dehydration. I don't know if it is too late to try this, but the product Cinchona helps get the moisture back in tissues and fluids back in system. Just a thought....and of course probiotics..but not if he is on antibiotics, but he's probably in need of some gut bacteria.

Treesa

[Pidgey]

Is that (Cinchona) something that I can get at a normal health food store? His poop was looking pretty good until he started keeping the water in and now I see a lot more urine. It's only been a day and a half since full closure so I don't think that's unexpected.

I should probably take the Baytril out of the water and dose it directly with a metering syringe so that he can drink all he wants without overdoing it until he gets over that. That deal didn't show up until lunchtime today.

If I shift to straight dosing at intervals, I can give probiotics off-shift, right?

Pidgey

[Trees Gray]

Yep, you can get that at most health food stores, like Wild Oats, or Mothers Market.

Baytril kills good bacteria as well as bad, so probiotics will be needed off shift, but won't that render the Baytril useless? I've never done that..why don't you meter the Baytril first and see if that helps. I wouldn't start the probiotics until he is off the Baytril, or someone knows if it can be used on off shift.

How long will he be on the Baytril?

Treesa

[Pidgey]

Doc only said for a week so that's not too bad, anyway. Yeah, I vaguely remember some discussion on here about antibiotics and gut bacteria. I know they can and will wipe out good bacteria but I didn't think that providing an ongoing replacement of gut bacteria affected the efficacy of the drug in the body, as such...

Hmm... something to research I guess.

But you sure don't want to let them have grit with Baytril, I think. I think there's some confusion about antibiotics and grit. Some antibiotics are not affected or bind to calcium and some are and do. In the formulary (I think), it tells that kind of stuff. And I don't think all antibiotics are hard on gut bacteria, either, but I could certainly be wrong about that.

Pidgey

[feralpigeon]

Originally Posted by Pidgey

Doc only said for a week so that's not too bad, anyway. Yeah, I vaguely remember some discussion on here about antibiotics and gut bacteria. I know they can and will wipe out good bacteria but I didn't think that providing an ongoing replacement of gut bacteria affected the efficacy of the drug in the body, as such...

Hmm... something to research I guess.

But you sure don't want to let them have grit with Baytril, I think. I think there's some confusion about antibiotics and grit. Some antibiotics are not affected or bind to calcium and some are and do. In the formulary (I think), it tells that kind of stuff. And I don't think all antibiotics are hard on gut bacteria, either, but I could certainly be wrong about that.

Pidgey

I think there are different schools of thought on that. For myself, ( a human you know ), my doctors have advocated using probiotics during usage of antibiotics....I've seen in Ray'nJudy's post the same that they advocate giving concurrently. That way, you don't get as wiped out by the anti-biotic.

On the grit, I was under impression that if it was real gravel, it was fine to give w/anti-biotic...ie, the small granite type...hope so


fp

[cyro51]

But you sure don't want to let them have grit with Baytril, I think. I think there's some confusion about antibiotics and grit. Some antibiotics are not affected or bind to calcium and some are and do

Thanks Pidgie, I wasn't aware that Baytril was one of the drugs affected by calcium!

Cynthia