Prolapsed Vent for 3 days - Where to go from here???

[MuddyBootsPA]

Hello everyone,

Three days ago, one of my hens got a prolapsed vent, along with gleet. I've been treating it in all the standard ways, but after 3 days I still cannot get the vent to stay inside. It looks MUCH better than it did the first day & the tissue is much less swollen. The gleet is still not clearing up, although I've been treating that in all the standard ways too. A little history is that ever since the hens began laying (about a month ago), I have had shell-less eggs & very thin eggs. I finally realized last week she was the one doing it after she laid a shell-less right in front of me. So when this happened, I wasn't especially surprised.

She is a dark room in a covered hospital crate. Her spirits are up & she is sick of being in the crate. I am not comfortable letting her back into the coop yet, obviously. I did let her free range a little this morning with the other girls. They ran up to see her & they were all very happy to be reunited.

I have tried to look up some information on how to proceed after the first few days with a prolapse, but haven't found much info even after reading quite a lot of threads. I am worried that I may never get her vent to stay back inside properly. I am also concerned she will never be a successful layer. I am fine with her not laying properly, but I just want to make sure she is not going to continue to suffer.

We are not opposed to culling her, if in her best interest, even though we haven't ever done it yet. We are also not opposed to letting her live out a natural life as best as she can, as long as she isn't always suffering.

So where do we go from here???? Are there other medical procedures that we can do for the later stages ourselves to help correct the prolapse? In your experience, do you think this will always be a problem for her? Do you have any chickens that have continued to survive even with a permanent prolapse? What is the prognosis?

Thanks in advance to all responders! I don't have much luck getting a lot of answers usually, but hopefully you guys will take pity on a desperate chicken mama looking for advice!

 

[Eggcessive]

I don't have experience with prolapse and hopefully those who have treated this will post. In my reading, it seems this happens again and again to the same chicken, and many die of it. I would seriously consider culling her and putting her out of misery. I had read where someone recently talked about a "purse string procedure" being done on a prolapsed vent, but don't know if that is common or that successful. Hope you can make a decision that works for you.

 

[Eggcessive]

Okay, I found the source for the purse string procedure. Click on this link and go to the bottom picture: http://www.lbah.com/avian/prolapsed_cloaca.htm#trt

 

[Haunted55]

Hello everyone,

Three days ago, one of my hens got a prolapsed vent, along with gleet. I've been treating it in all the standard ways, but after 3 days I still cannot get the vent to stay inside. It looks MUCH better than it did the first day & the tissue is much less swollen. The gleet is still not clearing up, although I've been treating that in all the standard ways too. A little history is that ever since the hens began laying (about a month ago), I have had shell-less eggs & very thin eggs. I finally realized last week she was the one doing it after she laid a shell-less right in front of me. So when this happened, I wasn't especially surprised.

She is a dark room in a covered hospital crate. Her spirits are up & she is sick of being in the crate. I am not comfortable letting her back into the coop yet, obviously. I did let her free range a little this morning with the other girls. They ran up to see her & they were all very happy to be reunited.

I have tried to look up some information on how to proceed after the first few days with a prolapse, but haven't found much info even after reading quite a lot of threads. I am worried that I may never get her vent to stay back inside properly. I am also concerned she will never be a successful layer. I am fine with her not laying properly, but I just want to make sure she is not going to continue to suffer.

We are not opposed to culling her, if in her best interest, even though we haven't ever done it yet. We are also not opposed to letting her live out a natural life as best as she can, as long as she isn't always suffering.

So where do we go from here???? Are there other medical procedures that we can do for the later stages ourselves to help correct the prolapse? In your experience, do you think this will always be a problem for her? Do you have any chickens that have continued to survive even with a permanent prolapse? What is the prognosis?

Thanks in advance to all responders! I don't have much luck getting a lot of answers usually, but hopefully you guys will take pity on a desperate chicken mama looking for advice!

have you tried giving her calcium with vitamin D? I'm not sure if you saw this thread below, but it tells what I did with a goose with prolapse and egg binding. The treatment would be the same. If you keep the vent area clean and moist, yeah kinda hard with gleet but all the same, try. To the treatment with the calcium with vitamin D I would add a good probiotic to clear up the gleet.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/738201/goose-what-is-this-how-did-it-happen-what-do-i-do-about-it

As for Lucy, she hasn't had another episode of prolapse again and laid a bunch of eggs later in the spring. Sometimes it just takes a little bit of a jump start to get their system working right. Good luck!

 

[MuddyBootsPA]

Thanks for the advice, everyone!

Gonna keep plugging along, for now.

 

[BantamLover21]

When I (recently) had a bird with prolapse, I did the following:

First, I soaked her lower half in warm water (at least 90 degrees) and tried to clean off the prolapse. I'm not sure if yours is doing the same thing, but when mine had prolapse there was a constant trickle of a white pasty substance from the vent, which made her a mess and probably irritated the prolapse. So, cleaning it was a chore, and I was never able to completely clean off the stuck-on white paste.
Along with soaking her, I isolated her and put her in a clean cage. I gave her layer feed and oyster shell, along with water that had vitamins, electrolytes, and probiotics in it. However, I only gave her feed in the morning and at night, and kept her cage dark. Those things were done to help prevent her from laying (though she did end up laying an egg the first day, she stopped after that).
The first day she was prolapsed, I put some honey and Witch Hazel on the prolapse to get it to shrink. This worked somewhat, and I was able to push the prolapse in. I pushed it back in throughout the day. Unfortunately, it would always come out after a few minutes. Consequently, there was no improvement the first day.
The second day, I soaked her in warm water in the morning, but accomplished nothing. That night, after another soaking, I made a mixture of honey and Witch Hazel. I combined the two because I didn't think that I was getting much Witch Hazel onto the prolapse because it was such a thin substance. Mixed with honey, it became thick. I then applied the mixture to her prolapse. It actually retracted back in about half way on its own, and stayed like that for about 15 minutes. I did not try to push the prolapse back in this time, as I suspected that the constant handling was irritating the tissue.
The next, third day, I put more Witch Hazel and honey on the prolapse after another soaking. Once again, I did not push the prolapse back in. I continued to apply a honey/Witch Hazel mixture throughout the day. There was no noticeable improvement.
That night, I soaked the pullet for about 30 minutes (longer than before) in even warmer water (at least 95 degrees). Within a few minutes, the prolapse shrank back in all on its own! This happened even though the prolapse wasn't completely clean of the white pasty substance. The pullet remained in isolation for a few more days, and then went back with the rest of her friends. Ever since, she has laid perfectly normal eggs.
I'm not entirely sure what fixed my pullet's prolapse, but I think it was a combination of leaving the prolapse along, but still applying honey and Witch Hazel to it, and soaking her for such a long time that night.
Well, maybe you will find the above information helpful. I really hope that your hen recovers!

 

[MuddyBootsPA]

Thanks so much! That sounds like what we have been doing so far. She is in great spirits. Her prolapse has shrunk up a lot. I think the next few days will be very telling as to how her recovery will be.

 

[Haunted55]

When I (recently) had a bird with prolapse, I did the following:

First, I soaked her lower half in warm water (at least 90 degrees) and tried to clean off the prolapse. I'm not sure if yours is doing the same thing, but when mine had prolapse there was a constant trickle of a white pasty substance from the vent, which made her a mess and probably irritated the prolapse. So, cleaning it was a chore, and I was never able to completely clean off the stuck-on white paste.
Along with soaking her, I isolated her and put her in a clean cage. I gave her layer feed and oyster shell, along with water that had vitamins, electrolytes, and probiotics in it. However, I only gave her feed in the morning and at night, and kept her cage dark. Those things were done to help prevent her from laying (though she did end up laying an egg the first day, she stopped after that).
The first day she was prolapsed, I put some honey and Witch Hazel on the prolapse to get it to shrink. This worked somewhat, and I was able to push the prolapse in. I pushed it back in throughout the day. Unfortunately, it would always come out after a few minutes. Consequently, there was no improvement the first day.
The second day, I soaked her in warm water in the morning, but accomplished nothing. That night, after another soaking, I made a mixture of honey and Witch Hazel. I combined the two because I didn't think that I was getting much Witch Hazel onto the prolapse because it was such a thin substance. Mixed with honey, it became thick. I then applied the mixture to her prolapse. It actually retracted back in about half way on its own, and stayed like that for about 15 minutes. I did not try to push the prolapse back in this time, as I suspected that the constant handling was irritating the tissue.
The next, third day, I put more Witch Hazel and honey on the prolapse after another soaking. Once again, I did not push the prolapse back in. I continued to apply a honey/Witch Hazel mixture throughout the day. There was no noticeable improvement.
That night, I soaked the pullet for about 30 minutes (longer than before) in even warmer water (at least 95 degrees). Within a few minutes, the prolapse shrank back in all on its own! This happened even though the prolapse wasn't completely clean of the white pasty substance. The pullet remained in isolation for a few more days, and then went back with the rest of her friends. Ever since, she has laid perfectly normal eggs.
I'm not entirely sure what fixed my pullet's prolapse, but I think it was a combination of leaving the prolapse along, but still applying honey and Witch Hazel to it, and soaking her for such a long time that night.
Well, maybe you will find the above information helpful. I really hope that your hen recovers!

The pasty stuff is Gleet. I have used baby shampoo and even Dawn dish soap to get it off. The water I used was a lot warmer than that as well. Warm enough that my hand was on the verge of turning red, but not quite. It takes a lot of work, picking and breaking it up with your fingers, to get it to release, but it needs to be done as soon as possible. This stuff is eating at the skin and causing pain and swelling. With my chicken that had the Gleet I also coated her vent area with vitamin E oil and or nystatin ointment. this kept the yeast from burning the skin and the 'cement' from sticking. I also added a good probiotic to the chicken's diet and it cleared the gleet up in a week.

With my goose I used the vitamin E after trying the honey. E worked, the honey didn't. I never tried to push anything back in as I figured this could cause more problems than she already had. The E oil shrinks the tissue, the tissue goes back all by itself. I also did not give layer or oyster shell. I gave the human Calcium with D as already stated. Mine did have a binding problem and this not only took care of that it also helped with the muscles needed to keep the vent inside where it belongs after the swelling went down.

 

[MuddyBootsPA]

I hadn't thought of the Vitamin E! Good call! I will definitely try that out. Yesterday, her prolapse went in all by itself. She is tired of being inside the hospital cage & her spirits are really good. Do you think she is past the point of infection? She prolapsed on Wednesday.

 

[BantamLover21]

The pasty stuff is Gleet. I have used baby shampoo and even Dawn dish soap to get it off. The water I used was a lot warmer than that as well. Warm enough that my hand was on the verge of turning red, but not quite. It takes a lot of work, picking and breaking it up with your fingers, to get it to release, but it needs to be done as soon as possible. This stuff is eating at the skin and causing pain and swelling. With my chicken that had the Gleet I also coated her vent area with vitamin E oil and or nystatin ointment. this kept the yeast from burning the skin and the 'cement' from sticking. I also added a good probiotic to the chicken's diet and it cleared the gleet up in a week.

With my goose I used the vitamin E after trying the honey. E worked, the honey didn't. I never tried to push anything back in as I figured this could cause more problems than she already had. The E oil shrinks the tissue, the tissue goes back all by itself. I also did not give layer or oyster shell. I gave the human Calcium with D as already stated. Mine did have a binding problem and this not only took care of that it also helped with the muscles needed to keep the vent inside where it belongs after the swelling went down.

So when a bird prolapses, it automatically gets vent gleet? My bird didn't have any signs of Gleet until the day she prolapsed. I think it was probably urates that were continually being passed.
Well, thanks for the information on the vitamin E! If mine prolapses again, I'll be sure to try it.