Having eye problems again! PICTURES

bekki5

bekki5

New Member
Please help :( I was having eye problems with my cam a month ago and then he was starting to get better but now he's just worse again : / his right eye is always swollen. sometimes he wont open it. He also has his days where he just sleeps all day and then some days he's all over the place. What should I do and from the pictures what does it look like what's wrong??

I mist him at least twice a day, sometimes with vitamin water. I dust his crickets and he also eats mealworms, waxworms, butterworms, silkworms and pheonix worms... His UVB light it new, it's a tube one. He has one 100watt light on. He also has a dripping system along with a small waterfall thing. I also have 7 live plants in his cage, which is screened. 36 x 24 X 24.

in this photo you can see the right eye compared to the left..
http://i764.photobucket.com/albums/xx281/bekkizon/sickcam2.jpg

In this you can see he keeps his eye closed majority of the time..
http://i764.photobucket.com/albums/xx281/bekkizon/sickcam1.jpg

And this is an example of this blowing-up-thing he does with his eye..
http://i764.photobucket.com/albums/xx281/bekkizon/sickcam.jpg
 
vitamin water

i cant tell you what the problem is, but i can tell you he needs a experienced CHAM vet asap. frequent (plain water preferably heated) misting is good , but i would not mist with vitamin water. what kind of vitamin water are you using ? most store vitamin waters have sugar or even worse high fructose corn syrup. if you are simply adding powdered supplement to his misting water probably not good either . i have seen similar problems where overly, dusted crickets were just getting dumped in the cage frequently above the cham so the excess dusting powder was also getting dumped on the cham, so it is not unreasonable to think that the vitamin water could be to blame. whether to blame or not (there is also a whole plethura of other possible causes as well) he definitely needs a real cham vet as soon as you can possibly arrainge it. i dont feel it is likely that you will be able to "self remedy" him back to health at this point, and time could be of the essence. in the meantime, all you can really do is continue misting (with plain water) and rinse his eyes with either saline solution or distilled water (none of the above meant as a substitute for genuine vet care) sorry i didnt have a better answer for you but you wanted opinions and that is mine. a good tool for rinsing is a curved tip dental syringe https://www.chameleonforums.com/rubbing-his-eye-35397/#post326741
 
What kind of tube lamp? what brand and model?

He might need some good misting to clean his eye out... He could also be having a eye infection. Check out the link below to learn how to clean his eye. LLL sells Terramycin, it is good for cleaning up infections.

Link
 
i would remove the water fall thing......often bacteria and bad things build up in there and can get him real sick...... i would increase his misting to 3-4 times a day and at least 2-5 minutes each time you mist (make sure the cage dries out before misting another session)....it is a lot and a pain using a hand pump but its effective specially in eye care of a cham....... definitely do what summoner said.... if you cant do that then goto walgreens and buy some refreshtears comes in a green bottle and box i believe and get that into his open eye twice a day my chams eye had a problem and i did this for about 4 days and misted his cage more often and it cleared up except his eye got crust around it from being swollen but hes good now...
 
I have seen eyes on panthers swollen like this many times on the forums over the last few years and I don't remember anyone finding a solution to it or any vet providing an explanation for it.

I have seen this type of swelling in a panther...but in one eye only...where there was cancer involved...but I doubt that it would show up in both eyes at the same time.

I have also seen this happen with one eye when the chameleon had a respiratory issue...but again I have never heard of it being in both eyes at the same time for RI's.

I have also seen this happen when there was a parasite involved...but I can't remember if both eyes were involved then....it was 15 or so years ago.

I wish I could offer you a reason or a solution. :(
 
Have you given him a shower? He may need one. It looks like there may be something in his eye. A shower may be the solution. Make sure you use luke warm water.

-Clemonde
 
thank you all, I believe the bulb is zoo med and it's 0.5 UVB... I've taken him to the only vet I know of around me to fix his eye and he suggested that it was a respiratory infection and that he didn't think anything was actually in the eye from the looks of it. so he was on meds for a few weeks and no improvement at all. I have cleaned out his eyes several times and that hasn't helped either which just leads me to believe that it's an infection. Is there a way to treat an eye infection?? my doctor didn't think it was an infection/ when I asked how we'd treat it if it was one he didn't seem to have a straight answer. I'm going to increase his misting though and try to get him better hydrated. He also hasn't eaten in quite a few days now and when food is in front of him he isnt interested at all.
 
Cleaning their eyes. Make a long drive if you have to get him to a vet, but get him to a vet.
 
I would get a weak saline solution (use the purest water you can, and just a pinch of salt), and flush the eye out with a visine dripper or syringe.

Make sure you use a syringe that is dependable - not one of those ones where you have to press HARD and it squirts out with force.

I would try to flush his eye out once or twice a day every day for a week.

You might also want to get a q-tip, wet it, and rub it from his skull > outwards to his eye opening. This will help losen the debris so the flushing will get it, or it might work it out completely.

Make sure there are no branches where he will rub his eye and get a sliver.
 
Get him to a vet..........

Please take him to a vet right away. Eye issues like this are not something to play around with. You risk blindness or partial blindness. The problem is not going to go away with saline, misting or showering. The vet needs to take a special scope and look at the eye(s) surface to look for scratching, debris, etc. It has gotten to the point where there is probably an infection or bacteria in there.

There are two antibiotics that work. One is Gentamicin (a clear fluid given with a dropper) that must be prescribed. It works on gram-negative bacteria infections. Terramycin is an ointment which can be bought on the internet and works on gram-positive bacteria. I buy a couple of tubes at a time since it's cheap and it works well for moistening the eye turret area if all the shed does not come off. Your problem is that you don't know if the infection is caused by gram-negative or gram-positive bacteria. There is a difference. All antibiotics, whether an ointment, injectable or oral type, are designed to work agains on or the other types of bacteria. A vet with good reptile experience will figure out what to use.

Saline is something you can use to hydrate and wash out between treatments. You also need to stop misting with anything but water (run through a tap filter). Anything else could be causing irritation that has erupted into something worse.
 
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