Infinite ink
New Member
anyone know of any good vets that specialize or are more lenient towards chameleons in Chicago??
Good vets for Chameleons in chicago??
- Thread starter Infinite ink
- Start date
athena9995
New Member
I know of a really good vet in Lisle, but maybe that's too far. You could try this link though www.reptilevetsnearyou.com.
athena9995
New Member
That's where I go. Thought it was Lisle. He's awesome and gave me a discount for having been at the reptile swap in Wheaton.
moostreich
New Member
I wanted to post on here in case anyone else is looking for a good Chameleon Veterinarian in Chicago and thinks about going to Dr. Gray. My boyfriend and I took our 1.5 year old female veiled chameleon, Midge, to Dr. Gray on 3/26/2020 and 04/18/2020 based on the recommendations on this very post. We are new chameleon owners (March 2019) and don't have tons of experience and were very worried about her. I attached a photo of what our girl, Midge, looked like. She had black spots on her skin (we think from falling in her cage) and her skin was very ashy and loose. She didn't look very good.
Dr. Gray told us, on 3/26/2020, we should increase her calcium dusting and vitamin A supplements, but also thought it was "just as likely if not more likely that she was dehydrated rather than vitamin A deficient". He also said "she is alert and active, which I take as a good sign". We went home feeling better, but still uneasy. He said we should call if she declines further, but to put Midge in the shower and increase her supplements.
We took Midge back to Dr. Gray on 04/18/2020. She still hadn't improved and still had ashen, loose skin and the big black area on her skin. Dr. Gray examined her and said her weight was good and her grip strength was good. He said her knee, which we had concerns about a bump on it, looked okay. He said it was possible something in the joint is causing trouble, it could be an infection from the joint, or she could have banged it on the cage. He also mentioned that her skin looked healthy. He gave us silver sulfaziadine cream as an antiseptic to apply to Midge as a general defense against bacteria. He said we could do an x-ray if things got worse.
I came away from both meetings feeling like he didn't really know what he was talking about. Just by looking at Midge, I felt like you could tell something was really off. We finally posted here on the chameleon forums and got a strong consensus that something was really wrong and our girl was sick.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/threads/veiled-chameleon-possibly-sick.175292/#post-1567725
We got a recommendation and took her to Chicago Exotics Animal Hospital in Skokie, IL. The veterinarian there, Dr. Giese was really helpful and told us Midge looked sick. It was clear right away that she was far more knowledgable than Dr. Gray. She ordered a blood panel and an x-ray and found that Midge was egg-bound. She couldn't lay her eggs awhile back and they were all stuck inside of her and were now rotting. Here is what Dr. Giese explained to us:
"I received Midge's bloodwork today and wanted to get this information to you. There are some significant changes as we were worried about. The first big change is her white blood cell count- normally this should be under 10,000 cells/uL and hers is at 22,000 cells/uL. This means there is severe inflammation and infection happening in her body. Her calcium and phosphorous values are incredibly high- these two values are regulated by the kidneys. Even though her uric acid value is not high (a waste product filtered by the kidneys) I am concerned about her kidneys due to how high these values are. One of her liver enzymes (AST) is increased and she has a very high cholesterol which can indicate liver disease.
Little Midge is very sick- with severe infection, liver dysfunction, and also likely kidney disease I am concerned if she would survive surgery. Reptiles are very hardy creatures so certainly it would be something we could try but with this bloodwork she does have a very guarded to grave prognosis. It would not be wrong to humanely euthanize her."
After talking about it we made the difficult choice to euthanize Midge two days ago. We miss her so. Chicago Exotics was really great and very caring throughout the process. I just wanted to leave this feedback because it is hard to take care of chameleons, especially when you are new at it. They just live, in the wild, in such different environments and it isn't easy to recreate. If this can help one person be more cautious of Dr. Gray and help their Chameleon, it would make us feel like we helped someone and that the loss of Midge wasn't in vain.
Dr. Gray told us, on 3/26/2020, we should increase her calcium dusting and vitamin A supplements, but also thought it was "just as likely if not more likely that she was dehydrated rather than vitamin A deficient". He also said "she is alert and active, which I take as a good sign". We went home feeling better, but still uneasy. He said we should call if she declines further, but to put Midge in the shower and increase her supplements.
We took Midge back to Dr. Gray on 04/18/2020. She still hadn't improved and still had ashen, loose skin and the big black area on her skin. Dr. Gray examined her and said her weight was good and her grip strength was good. He said her knee, which we had concerns about a bump on it, looked okay. He said it was possible something in the joint is causing trouble, it could be an infection from the joint, or she could have banged it on the cage. He also mentioned that her skin looked healthy. He gave us silver sulfaziadine cream as an antiseptic to apply to Midge as a general defense against bacteria. He said we could do an x-ray if things got worse.
I came away from both meetings feeling like he didn't really know what he was talking about. Just by looking at Midge, I felt like you could tell something was really off. We finally posted here on the chameleon forums and got a strong consensus that something was really wrong and our girl was sick.
https://www.chameleonforums.com/threads/veiled-chameleon-possibly-sick.175292/#post-1567725
We got a recommendation and took her to Chicago Exotics Animal Hospital in Skokie, IL. The veterinarian there, Dr. Giese was really helpful and told us Midge looked sick. It was clear right away that she was far more knowledgable than Dr. Gray. She ordered a blood panel and an x-ray and found that Midge was egg-bound. She couldn't lay her eggs awhile back and they were all stuck inside of her and were now rotting. Here is what Dr. Giese explained to us:
"I received Midge's bloodwork today and wanted to get this information to you. There are some significant changes as we were worried about. The first big change is her white blood cell count- normally this should be under 10,000 cells/uL and hers is at 22,000 cells/uL. This means there is severe inflammation and infection happening in her body. Her calcium and phosphorous values are incredibly high- these two values are regulated by the kidneys. Even though her uric acid value is not high (a waste product filtered by the kidneys) I am concerned about her kidneys due to how high these values are. One of her liver enzymes (AST) is increased and she has a very high cholesterol which can indicate liver disease.
Little Midge is very sick- with severe infection, liver dysfunction, and also likely kidney disease I am concerned if she would survive surgery. Reptiles are very hardy creatures so certainly it would be something we could try but with this bloodwork she does have a very guarded to grave prognosis. It would not be wrong to humanely euthanize her."
After talking about it we made the difficult choice to euthanize Midge two days ago. We miss her so. Chicago Exotics was really great and very caring throughout the process. I just wanted to leave this feedback because it is hard to take care of chameleons, especially when you are new at it. They just live, in the wild, in such different environments and it isn't easy to recreate. If this can help one person be more cautious of Dr. Gray and help their Chameleon, it would make us feel like we helped someone and that the loss of Midge wasn't in vain.
MissSkittles
Chameleon Enthusiast
I’m sorry that you lost your girl, but it sounds like you made the right choice for her.
