BudgetBunny
New member
A little over a month ago my parrotlet lost the ability to use her feet and became very drowsy looking. This lasted about a 1/2 hour then she suddenly snapped out of it and returned to normal. She was fine for about 4 days and then the same thing happened again.
Our initial vet visit confirmed egg yolk peritonitis and we began a 10 day treatment. After finishing the treatment she still seemed off and one night we believe she suffered a seizure (although we can't determine it was this or just her choking or if her throwing up was caused by the seizure she experienced) so I ended up back at the vet. An exam determined she had decided this was a perfect time to develop another egg. They had me continue her pain medication to hopefully make it nice and easy for her to pass the egg. Unfortunately the egg broke insider her and we ended up back at the vet. They weren't able to remove the shards and another x-ray showed fluid around the shell so we began another 2 week treatment of the same meds - baytril and metacam.
We finished the treatment and for 8 days Ella was doing awesome! We were sure the worst was behind us until suddenly she relapsed. It was only for about 15 minutes and thankfully there doesn't seem to be any permanent damage when these episodes occur.
We brought her back to the vet for another physical and bloodwork. On all other levels Ella seems normal. Nothing shows up in her x-ray, blood work for white blood cell count, kidney and liver function are all normal. Heart is good, calcium is good and bones are strong. After doing these tests we have determined it to be neurological. Our vet believes she has been suffering a series of small strokes and perhaps it was a seizure we experienced before.
At this point we feel it is too risky and too stressful for Ella to undergo any further testing, we also feel that getting an exact diagnosis after pinpointing it's neurological isn't going to really help her more. Moments after completing the blood work Ella began another stroke, they had to put her on oxygen and it was the worst stroke yet. It was scary so I don't want to put Ella through anything else that will stress and possibly cause her strokes to worsen or happen.
The vet told us that if she seemed in pain or they were happening regularly we could talk about putting her on valium as this has seemed to help birds who are stroke prone get through them but when she has a stroke she seems fine to just sit with me and have a snuggle and head skritches until it passes. She doesn't chirp or seem scared.
They also said I could do another round of the baytril and metacam if I felt this had helped prevent them but of course we don't know that this was the case - she could have just not been having an episode anyways and there are risks having her on long term medication like damaging her liver which we know is healthy right now so do I risk this? It's so many what ifs....Right now I am just journalling her day to day activities - what she ate, her poop, how she seemed, anything that may give me a possible reason as to why these are occuring.
I guess at this point I am just hoping that someone else can provide some insight, information, share their stories, maybe they found a treatment that worked for their bird. Anything you'd like to share I would love to hear.
Thank you.
Ella & Krystle
Our initial vet visit confirmed egg yolk peritonitis and we began a 10 day treatment. After finishing the treatment she still seemed off and one night we believe she suffered a seizure (although we can't determine it was this or just her choking or if her throwing up was caused by the seizure she experienced) so I ended up back at the vet. An exam determined she had decided this was a perfect time to develop another egg. They had me continue her pain medication to hopefully make it nice and easy for her to pass the egg. Unfortunately the egg broke insider her and we ended up back at the vet. They weren't able to remove the shards and another x-ray showed fluid around the shell so we began another 2 week treatment of the same meds - baytril and metacam.
We finished the treatment and for 8 days Ella was doing awesome! We were sure the worst was behind us until suddenly she relapsed. It was only for about 15 minutes and thankfully there doesn't seem to be any permanent damage when these episodes occur.
We brought her back to the vet for another physical and bloodwork. On all other levels Ella seems normal. Nothing shows up in her x-ray, blood work for white blood cell count, kidney and liver function are all normal. Heart is good, calcium is good and bones are strong. After doing these tests we have determined it to be neurological. Our vet believes she has been suffering a series of small strokes and perhaps it was a seizure we experienced before.
At this point we feel it is too risky and too stressful for Ella to undergo any further testing, we also feel that getting an exact diagnosis after pinpointing it's neurological isn't going to really help her more. Moments after completing the blood work Ella began another stroke, they had to put her on oxygen and it was the worst stroke yet. It was scary so I don't want to put Ella through anything else that will stress and possibly cause her strokes to worsen or happen.
The vet told us that if she seemed in pain or they were happening regularly we could talk about putting her on valium as this has seemed to help birds who are stroke prone get through them but when she has a stroke she seems fine to just sit with me and have a snuggle and head skritches until it passes. She doesn't chirp or seem scared.
They also said I could do another round of the baytril and metacam if I felt this had helped prevent them but of course we don't know that this was the case - she could have just not been having an episode anyways and there are risks having her on long term medication like damaging her liver which we know is healthy right now so do I risk this? It's so many what ifs....Right now I am just journalling her day to day activities - what she ate, her poop, how she seemed, anything that may give me a possible reason as to why these are occuring.
I guess at this point I am just hoping that someone else can provide some insight, information, share their stories, maybe they found a treatment that worked for their bird. Anything you'd like to share I would love to hear.
Thank you.
Ella & Krystle
