Baytril or Cipro?

[AmyJane725]

Hey, so my other topics haven't gotten much attention, so I'm gonna try again with a different angle.

My hen is sick. We've been to the vet 5 times now. None of the antibiotics they've been giving me seem to help.

Baytril or Ciprofloxacin seem to be the best options at this point, but vets are no longer allowed to prescribe them.

I have some cipro eardrops left over from when I had an ear infection. I'd have to find the bottle, but would that be better than Baytril? If not, does anyone know of a good source for baytril? I guess it used to be the go-to med for pet birds back before it became illegal to give it.

 

[Folly's place]

It's a very good drug, but not for poultry any more.
If antibiotics aren't working, why add one more?
Mary

 

[AmyJane725]

Because those two could be effective where the others have fallen short. And if I do nothing she's going to die, so I have nothing to lose. I don't eat her eggs, and she's not a meat bird. If your child was dying and you knew of a treatment that might save them, but the government said you couldn't use it for reasons that don't even apply to your situation, wouldn't you do it anyway? She's my baby. I'm not giving up when there could be a cure.

 

[casportpony]

My hen is sick. We've been to the vet 5 times now. None of the antibiotics they've been giving me seem to help.

What have you tried? Has the vet done a poo gram stain?

Baytril or Ciprofloxacin seem to be the best options at this point, but vets are no longer allowed to prescribe them.

Lots of vets still prescribe them.

I have some cipro eardrops left over from when I had an ear infection.

Not enough Cipro in it.

If not, does anyone know of a good source for baytril?

Baytril 10% - All Bird Products​

Enrofloxyn: Bird Medications - LadyGouldianFinch.com​

I would give 0.068 ml per pound of body weight(15mg/kg) twice a day for 3-5 days.

 

[AmyJane725]

Thank you so much. I ordered some! I think this might be the first time I've sprung for expedited shipping.

I had the abscess contents cultured. It's E. coli. No guarantee that's what's making her sick now, but I imagine chances are pretty good since that's what was in her abscess. Here's the sensitivity results: And keep in mind that the abscess was opened and scooped out before starting each new Rx.

-Gentamicin: Sensitive
-Neomycin: Sensitive
-Lincomycin: Resistant
-Ampicillin: Sensitive
-Amoxicillin: Sensitive
-Clavamox: Sensitive (Tried this one first. Didn't even shrink the abscess)
-Tetracycline: Resistant
-Doxycycline: Sensitive
-Potentiated Sulfonamide: Sensitive (Third Rx she had. Shrank abscess significantly. Thought she was better and just needed to get a little more healing in. Skin wasn't inflamed anymore. Just a little bigger than the other side still.)
-Erythromycin: Resistant
-Spectinomycin: Sensitive
-Terramycin: Resistant (Second Rx we tried while waiting for the culture results to come back. Didn't work as you might guess)

 

[Banana01]

You may be dealing with a viral sickness, but I agree it is worth a try and applaud your thinking outside of the box for medicines. The vets and regulations are nonsense to me, i live outside the us and can buy any farm meds without paying hundreds of dollars to get someones permission.

But what are the sickness symptoms you are seeing? Are you up to date with deworming and coccidiosis treatment? Are there any signs of mites on the face or head? If those are yes, then antibiotics should be the next treatment.

I have enrofloxacin liquid drops, and several other antibiotics i have mixed together that offer relief. You have to just make sure the drug interactions and side effects arent negative, and mixing antibiotics is common.

So for

Enrofloxin (baytril)
Ciprofloxacin

They are both Fluoroquinolone. I dont think it would be recommended to give both, because it may not even broaden the scope of the medicine. If you have enrofloxacin, i would give that one. It is even sold where i live for treating chickens.

Ciorofloxacin on the other hand has some horrendous side effects and the directions are extremely strict and you would have to be very careful and monitor for side effects to stop immediately. Even exposure to sunlight on the medicine has possible bad effects.

 

[AmyJane725]

But what are the sickness symptoms you are seeing?

-At the very beginning she just had a big pea sized bulge over her left eye. Was still eating and drinking fine. No other symptoms.
Got abscess incised and drained and first round of antibiotics (Clavamox), no change. Skin healed closed very quickly and then puffed back up to pre-drainage size at the end of the treatment.
-Second vet trip we had it incised and drained again, and I paid to have the pus cultured. Vet gave Terramycin ointment while we waited. I was supposed to apply it into the wound hole and into her eye, but it closed up after two days. (Turns out it's resistant to Terramycin anyway, so it didn't really matter)
-Third vet visit got it incised and drained again, and he gave Sulfa drug Rx. That seemed to help a lot. The area was almost back down to normal size, not red/hot anymore, but two days before the end of the 10 day course she stared going downhill very fast. Wouldn't eat or drink anymore, feet were cold, deathly pale. Very lethargic.
-Took her to the vet for the fourth time on day after MLK day and he said he thought was just because her guts were probably messed up after all the antibiotics, so he gave me probiotics, special dog/cat food for extra nutrition, and some subcutaneous fluids. Syringe fed her the food and water, but it didn't seem to help much. Her color might be a tiny bit better, but nothing to write home about.
-I picked up some Kaytee exact baby parrot food and started tube feeding her a couple days ago because she was still going downhill. She seemed to perk up a bit and was trying to walk around more, and the poop was actually brown instead of the dark green starvation poop. Yesterday night I noticed some little bubbles in her right eye, and the area around the left eye is puffy again. It doesn't have the abscess bubble, but it's definitely puffed up and red and hot. Her eye itself is crusty, and when she opens it the eyeball is super wet looking. I don't know if gooey is the right word, but it just looks like there's more "water" on there than surface tension should allow.
-I took her to the vet for the fifth time today. He was surprised about the issues coming back since her face had looked basically normal 5 days ago. He said we could try clavamox again, but I asked about Tylan since the clavamox didn't seem to do much the first time, even though the E. coli is supposedly sensitive to it. He agreed and gave the Tylan and some Metacam for the inflammation and discomfort. He's worried if there's a foreign body that has travelled deeper inside her (like into the sinus maybe) that can't be removed, and the infection will just keep coming back forever until it kills her, but we're going to try the Tylan and hope for the best. And I just ordered some Baytril, so if I don't start seeing some improvement with the Tylan by the time the Baytril arrives I'm going to switch to that. If that doesn't work I guess I'll have to face putting her down, but in the meantime, that's my plan.

Are you up to date with deworming and coccidiosis treatment?

I'm gonna be honest, I have treated for coccidiosis one time during my time keeping chickens. It was when my chicks were a few weeks old. Haven't done it since. I've been keeping for 2 yr 8 months now. And I also don't worm my birds. I'm very vigilant and I've never seen any evidence of parasites (internal or external. I check them and their poop constantly). Never seen any eggs worms or anything of that nature in the poop, and they are symptom free. Plus I think it would be kind of weird if that's what was making her sick after all this time, especially since she hasn't even been outside for the last month, so she'd have had to have picked it up a month ago, not had any problems for the last three weeks of no possible exposure, and then gotten sick all of a sudden. I do appreciate the suggestion though.

Are there any signs of mites on the face or head?

Nope. She's totally clean. Vet verified as well. She literally sleeps in my bed with me, and has been inside for 4 weeks now, so no chance of her catching anything.

 

[Banana01]

-At the very beginning she just had a big pea sized bulge over her left eye. Was still eating and drinking fine. No other symptoms.
Got abscess incised and drained and first round of antibiotics (Clavamox), no change. Skin healed closed very quickly and then puffed back up to pre-drainage size at the end of the treatment.
-Second vet trip we had it incised and drained again, and I paid to have the pus cultured. Vet gave Terramycin ointment while we waited. I was supposed to apply it into the wound hole and into her eye, but it closed up after two days. (Turns out it's resistant to Terramycin anyway, so it didn't really matter)
-Third vet visit got it incised and drained again, and he gave Sulfa drug Rx. That seemed to help a lot. The area was almost back down to normal size, not red/hot anymore, but two days before the end of the 10 day course she stared going downhill very fast. Wouldn't eat or drink anymore, feet were cold. Very lethargic.
-Took her to the vet again on day after MLK day and he said he thought was just because her guts were probably messed up after all the antibiotics, so he gave me probiotics, special dog/cat food for extra nutrition, and some subcutaneous fluids.

I'm gonna be honest, I have treated for coccidiosis one time during my time keeping chickens. It was when my chicks were a few weeks old. Haven't done it since. I've been keeping for 2 yr 8 months now. And I also don't worm my birds. I'm very vigilant and I've never seen any evidence of parasites (internal or external. I check them and their poop constantly). Never seen any eggs worms or anything of that nature in the poop, and they are symptom free. Plus I think it would be kind of weird if that's what was making her sick after all this time, especially since she hasn't even been outside for the last month, so she'd have had to have picked it up a month ago, not had any problems for the last three weeks of no possible exposure, and then gotten sick all of a sudden. I do appreciate the suggestion though.

Nope. She's totally clean. Vet verified as well. She literally sleeps in my bed with me, and has been inside for 4 weeks now, so no chance of her catching anything.

The 10 day course of sulfa would have resulted in a thiamine deficiency. Sulfa is an anticocci, so you can consider that treatment done. The vet was correct to give probiotics and nutrient supplements.

But where are you now with the illness? Is she having reapiratory symptoms? Any picture of the eye before and after?

It maybe sounds like a pox that developed on her eye, which happens somwtimes worsened by cocci weakening the immune system. Pox (the dry type) will clear up on its own usually if the immune system can function normally and parasite free.

 

[AmyJane725]

The 10 day course of sulfa would have resulted in a thiamine deficiency. Sulfa is an anticocci, so you can consider that treatment done. The vet was correct to give probiotics and nutrient supplements.

But where are you now with the illness? Is she having reapiratory symptoms? Any picture of the eye before and after?

It maybe sounds like a pox that developed on her eye, which happens somwtimes worsened by cocci weakening the immune system. Pox (the dry type) will clear up on its own usually if the immune system can function normally and parasite free.

Sorry, I went back and added more to the original response that goes over where we are now if you want to have a look at that.

Doesn't Pox usually have scabs and stuff? It doesn't seem like that, but I could be wrong. I'm not an expert.

Would the organ meat pet food have thiamine in it to replace what she lost? Also, the Kaytee food has probiotics in it, so I've been using that instead of what he gave me. Should I give both? You can't really overdo it on probiotics, can you?

 

[Banana01]

Sorry, I went back and added more to the original response that goes over where we are now if you want to have a look at that.

Doesn't Pox usually have scabs and stuff? It doesn't seem like that, but I could be wrong. I'm not an expert.

Would the organ meat pet food have thiamine in it to replace what she lost? Also, the Kaytee food has probiotics in it, so I've been using that instead of what he gave me. Should I give both? You can't really overdo it on probiotics, can you?

I reread your post about ecoli. She may have scratched her eye and got an infection.

You can overdo it with probiotics. Is she eating now, she should be eating her regular food. Let more experts chime in on the diet. I dont remember if you said if she is eating normally or not. I know after i do my sulfa treatments my chickens usually eat normally until their crop is full.

I hope she pulls through for you. I dont see any reason you feel she is going to die?