Urgent Care :: rock ingestion

[elikagolara]

please help! our turtle has ingested a lot of gravel and the vet just gave us some laxative. if that does not work they said they will have to do extensive surgery and remove all the stones surgically. we are devistated and i don't think we should put her through that. do you guys have any info on rock ingestion?

[jenaero]

Have you removed the rest of the rocks/gravel already? If not, do that asap. You'd be amazed at the size of stones turtles can safely pass. Passing them will take time so you'll have to check the tank several times a day for passed stones and remove them immediately. You don't want her to pass it, then eat it again. When my res ate gravel I was picking it out of the tank several weeks later.

Before surgery, I'd get her x-rayed to make sure it's really necessary. If it comes down to it, I'd sooner put my turtle through surgery than let her die. It's all up to you but turtles are tough little buggers and recouperate from surgeries quite well.

Good luck and let us know what happens

[staman]

All i have to offer is keeping him in warmer water to help him pass objects more easily. Apparently people do this to help out constipated turtles. How big is your turtle compared to the gravel hes been eating?


I assume youve removed the gravel....

[elikagolara]

yes, we removed ALL the gravel. we feel really horrible for even having it there to begin with. she is 4 years old and we got her when she was just born. they took xrays. the whole cost of todays visit was $300.00
the surgery is $2000.00 but the xray showed a lot of stones. there was no more room left in her stomach. we just feel aweful.

[steve]

Warmer water does help with constipation. Is the turtle constipated? I would think that a followup x-ray is necessary and hopefully the gravel will all pass.

[ellman605]

I decided to take this out myself

[marisa]

The vet said if the laxative doesn't work, then surgery is likely? What kind of time frame did he give to determine if the laxative is working and surgery isn't warranted? If this just happened a day or two ago, I'd give the laxative some time to work. Putting your turtle in water that's comfortably warmer than the tank water will help relax the internal organs and make pooping easier, but if the stones are too large to pass may not help. (How big were the pieces of gravel?)

What kind of laxative is your turtle being given? I've heard of mineral oil being used--is this what you're giving your turtle? How is she behaving--will she eat? Is she active?

[elikagolara]

she is active. she has not eaten for 4 days now. we were given laxaire by the hospital. we've been using a syringe to give her the laxative. is not the size of the gravel at this point but the amount of it. the whole stomach is full of it. not even a bit of air bubble left. it was the strangest xray i had ever seen. i feel so bad about it. we are just waiting and hoping and it feels aweful. the surgery might not even work. i don't think we should put her through it.

[jenaero]

There's no reason the surgery shouldn't work. I mean, they get in there, take the gravel out and patch him up. Anyway, don't worry too much yet. Wait and see if he passes it.

And Elliot, please chill out a bit. A lot of people who come on here don't know a lot about turtle care and are here to learn. I'd bet that most of us when we first started didn't know a turtle would just eat anything that they could swallow. We learn as we go. You're coming off quite standoffish (imo) and she doesn't need to be put down...she feels bad enough I'm sure.

One more thing, I'd definetly spend anything I had to keep my pets alive.

[staman]

2000 does seem like a really high price tag. I dont think a lot of people would spend that on the family dog or cat. I would have taken a bullet for ole Monty but some people are different. Right now if I was faced with a 2k bill to save one of my turts Im not sure I could rationalize it. Then again 4 years from now ill probably mortgage the house to save the lil guys..

[marisa]

A 4-year old turtle can go for quite a bit more than 4 days without food. I'd still wait a bit and make sure she's getting the laxative into her. How long did the vet say to give her before surgery would be necessary? If I had any qualms at all about the course of action being recommended, I'd get a second opinion from another herp vet.

[elikagolara]

i am sorry to say it is over. we've lost her. we have ben crying like we've never cried before. i decided to take her back to the hospital. the second x-ray showed no improvement at all. dr. wyre told us they could do an endoscopy and remove some stones orally. they said the surgery might be too much for her as they would have to pass through other organs. we had to decide and i pushed for the endoscopy. my husband wanted to bring her home and just keep her for a little while longer. but i kept pushing it. the final cost was 780.00
she never recovered from the anesthesia. dr. wyre couldn't remove any stone at all and said there was too much gravel and she would have not made it through surgery either.
i feel like i cut her life shorter. i know she would have died from not eating evebtually and she WAS NOT passing any of it as the intestine was bruised and diseased from all the gravel.
it has been a horrible week. the tank still has the water in it. the basking light is still on and we feel like we've lost a family member. not many people understand us. we can't really tell our families how much we spent on putzi. her story will go on though as the doctors at the hospital said they were going to use her xrays to publish a paper on the topic.
we are thinking of getting another one in putzi's memory and treat the new one royally.

[ellman605]

i'm sorry, that really sad, it reminds me of the time we took our dog to the hospital after he had coughed up blood, and he died when the doctor came in to ask if we wanted him to have todd put to sleep. i'm really sorry. just remember we are all here for you.

[sonyj]

I'm so sorry for your loss.

[steve]

Sorry to hear it... it's very sad news and I hope you will feel better. It's amazing how much they can change our lives in such a short period of time.