Fowl pox on chick's eyelids - anything I can do to help it heal/make less painful?

[beachbunny76]

I've got a few chicks with fowl pox affecting their eyes It's hard to see them suffer...is there any treatment or supplement that I can do to help speed up their healing or help strengthen their immune systems to fight this?

I currently put Rooster Booster vits & electrolytes in their water and terramycin eye ointment on the affected lids. One chick keeps scratching at her eye and I worry it will get a secondary infection so I've been using veterycin eye wash then applying the terrimycin 3x daily.

Also, I saw one article where someone recommends putting iodine in their water....is that safe?

TIA!

 

[nuthatched]

You can put iodine on the sores with a qtip, just bit.

 

[Eggcessive]

Iodine drops is sometimes used to disinfect water to make it potable for campers. But I probably would just try to provide clean water each day, since they can be finicky about drinking water with additives. Some use Betadine to paint scabs to help them dry up, but do not do this around the eyes. No treatment is really effective for fowl pox, since it needs to run it’s course over a few weeks.

Do you have any pictures of the eyes? I would keep them clean with saline, and use the Terramycin or even triple antibiotic in the eyes where scabs are near. Here is a good article about the 2 types of fowl pox:
http://extension.msstate.edu/publications/fowl-pox-backyard-flocks

 

[beachbunny76]

Thank you both for your input. I still have 2 that are not looking good. One has a white spot on the eyeball now. See 1st 3 pics.The other is still swollen. I've been applying Teramycin the last few days but they keep scratching at it. The original chick’s eye sealed shut and I don’t know if it’s ever going to open up again (last pic)

Any thoughts on what else I can do?

 

[Frizzled-n-Sizzled]

I know this is an old post. But what ever happened to your chick? And what if any treatment helped?

 

[beachbunny76]

I know this is an old post. But what ever happened to your chick? And what if any treatment helped?

Unfortunately the one with the spot on the eyeball remained the same. It's eye is all gray now...it looks like she lost her eye Although, she is doing just fine and thriving so I guess it could have been worse.
The white one (image #7436) --her eye sealed shut just like the buff chick in image 7488. In terms of treatment, I don't know if there was anything else I could do for them. Maybe some other type of eye ointment? Or maybe I needed to be more aggressive with the Terramycin and apply it more frequently throughout the day? I don't know. All I can say is if you have a hen with fowl pox, try to separate the little ones if you have any as they are more susceptible to these results. My older ones are all fine. It just really hit these little ones hard. Aside from eye issues, I had another chick altogether get a slight crossbeak because of the fowlpox! It was growing on the side of his beak poor thing. Fowl pox sucks! I've installed screening on all the windows and vents of my coop.

 

[Frizzled-n-Sizzled]

Unfortunately the one with the spot on the eyeball remained the same. It's eye is all gray now...it looks like she lost her eye Although, she is doing just fine and thriving so I guess it could have been worse.
The white one (image #7436) --her eye sealed shut just like the buff chick in image 7488. In terms of treatment, I don't know if there was anything else I could do for them. Maybe some other type of eye ointment? Or maybe I needed to be more aggressive with the Terramycin and apply it more frequently throughout the day? I don't know. All I can say is if you have a hen with fowl pox, try to separate the little ones if you have any as they are more susceptible to these results. My older ones are all fine. It just really hit these little ones hard. Aside from eye issues, I had another chick altogether get a slight crossbeak because of the fowlpox! It was growing on the side of his beak poor thing. Fowl pox sucks! I've installed screening on all the windows and vents of my coop.

Sorry for your situation! It sounds really rough…

We’ve had a fowl pox in the past and it just ran its course max 3 weeks…. But nothing that affected their eyes. I did have one rooster that it looked like it turned to wet pox on the edge of his beak. But it was very mild and did clear up within a few weeks after treating with Neosporin. In June, I hatched a few chicks and they currently are finishing up dry fowl pox. However, our one little polish rooster’s eye is very watery… he keeps scratching too… which isn’t helpful. We are using the eye wash solution and antibiotic eyedrops with him. I also picked up some VetRX, vitamins, apple cider and herbs like oregano… to give him them all a boost… We just are trying to avoid a secondary infection.

This is unrelated to pox but I had a hen who got injured on her eye. Her eye was closed and cloudy… I was able to get the antibiotic eye cream and that cleared up within a week… I was treating her eye 2x and it was extremely cloudy too. Rinsing with warm saline as often as I could helped it not to get crusty.

Fowl pox does suck!

Not sure if this is an option for you or not… but if there is a local agricultural department in your area they may be able to come out, treat or prescribe something more. It almost looks like there is pus inside the eyes. Hope that your chickie babies, feel better soon!