Keep Biting her foot

[lovezebs]

biccio
How is your little girl feeling today? Is there any change for the better? My thoughts are with you all.

[biccio]

Hi All,

Thank you for your overwhelming support. First of all, she is doing generally well, she flies pretty well even if the landing is not great! She has her bandage on and I am not sure I will be able to remove it for the following reasons:

- when we tried this week, she got in great pain, her body was burning in temperature, and she did not have a great night trying to remove the bandage. WE believe the leg was hurting a lot and we thought she would not make it.

- the doctor told us the bone is exposed (honestly haven't seen it..I can try again or go back to the vet, but I am very tired of wasting money), and if the body does not reject it, it is very difficult for the wound to heal. the antibiotic was give to avoid any further infection, but it does not seem there is any great infection going.

- when she is in pain...she bites hard! I need to use gloves next time.

When she has a little more energy, I will try again. We are moving and they have to spend 2 days in a small cage and on the car. I don't want to add stress before or immediately after.

To answer few questions posted: she is about 1 year old...a little more probably. We got her from petsmart 1 year ago. I assumed the neck/throat problem is related to not drinking too much...anyway I am giving her by mouth as much water (with vitamins) as possible, since it should not hurt. She is pretty available to be picked up now (she was not after the bandage change).

I think I will need to replace the bandage once more, using neosporin to avoid the bandage to attach to the wound. Then I will try to remove it leaving it healing in fresh air.

[lovezebs]

biccio
Goodluck.
I didn't realize Ivory was so young, hardly more than a baby really. I hope her leg heals. Too bad the other leg doesn't work. If it did, she could at least perch on one leg. Poor kid.
I wish you a smooth move and hope all goes well.

[wildbird]

If you decide to rebandage it yourself, you might try something like Vet Wrap. A rehabber had told me that it is a bandage that only sticks to itself. I think you can get it at a drugstore. I think there is another name for it also, can't remember what it is. Good luck with your move & I hope she does well.

[Sally]

If you can't find vetrap at a drugstore, check with any feed store or equine vet or stable, it is a common horse bandage.

[MiaCarter]

Vetwrap is sold at the drug store as "sports wrap" or "self-adhering bandage"

[biccio]

HI All,

I have a very important update. Yesterday evening when we got home after dinner, we saw that she was able to remove the bandage by itself, and was quietly in the nest. We figured to leave it uncovered and to go to sleep as fast as possible.

This morning we were ready to keep an eye on her when she woke up, and strangely enough, she went back on biting the toe (which obviously started bleeding almost immediately. We place the bandage back again, but I was able to get some pictures.

Good news: it does not seem to me the bone is out or not healing. The leg was a lot less warm than the other day. I had the impression she is not in pain on the part (likely be the pain killer, but yesterday night we skipped till this morning).

Bad News: she keeps biting it. I feel she believes something is into her foot, so unless it heals completely, probably she will keep biting.

What do you think? We had the impression to foot grew a bit..but it might likely just be swollen.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/jfgrgqtdc17bfek/foot.jpg

[MiaCarter]

The bandage falling off is common.

When the swelling recedes, the bandage no longer fits snugly and it slips off.

Those toes are definitely gone.

It's hard to tell whether she has some necrotic (dead) tissue there or whether it's scabbed. Either one would be expected.

But the surrounding tissue looks pretty good. It's a bit hard to tell from the photo, but it doesn't look horribly infected or alarming to me.
It almost looks like there's a hole in the core of her foot around where the middle toe would be. So it's possible she had some bone peeking out of there?

She's going to keep biting at the foot until it fully heals.
When you lose a body part, you end up with severed nerve endings that send false messages to your brain. And the sensations are terrible.
I severed part of my palm and pinkie finger breaking up a dog fight. It was reattached, but man, in the first few weeks, the sensations were crazy. Burning, tingling, itching, crawling in my entire hand and arm, far beyond just the injured area. Every sensation you could imagine (yet it was totally numb to touch.)
It's annoying and uncomfortable and if I was an animal, I'd probably have been gnawing at it too. I imagine she's feeling some of those sensations.

So it'll be a while until you can leave it uncovered. She has exposed, severed and really irritated nerve endings in that foot.
I think she's going to mess with it until it heals, perhaps even after (it took months for the nerve sensations to subside for me...and I still get odd twinges.)

So I'd just keep her on the pain meds and the antibiotics. Keep it wrapped.
She'll probably get it off again as the swelling subsides even more.

They get really good at getting it off with time, too. I had to stop splinting a bird's leg once because he'd figured out how to rip it off in about 20 minutes. But he was at a point where he was okay without it, so.

I think she should be okay as long as she doesn't get infected.
So important to keep her from biting at it and the bandage will ensure she doesn't get it messy with poop or food.

[biccio]

MiaCarter thank you very much for the help, I appreciate it in this particular moment, and there are no word to express the incredible help this forum is giving me.

Now she removed it again...then she sat there for a while without biting...sometime she bites it, sometimes she just sit at the bottom of the cage. We'll cover it up soon, I want to give her some rest after the first stress(it was even pretty difficult to secure the bandage, and maybe she learnt how to remove it, as you said). We disinfect the part every time, and it does not seem infected (at least not badly infected).

I will keep her on antibiotic, pain killer, vitamins, and Bach natural stress reliever. Any help she can get, it might make the difference.

[biccio]

Today is almost over, and I am looking forward to it, since she is probably suffering a lot, and she is trying to remove the bandage so badly. She has lost almost entirely the feathers on her belly, while trying to remove the bandage.

She did remove 3 bandages, and we were forced to make a stronger one since she kept biting and bleeding.

I don't really know what to think anymore...I don't think she is in pain (she did not bite while covering the wound and she doesn't scream nor cry, assuming I know the difference) but she does not drink...and today barely eat.

[wildbird]

What did you use as a disinfectant? A chemical disinfectant can be very irratating. I wouldn't use anything other than warm water & dry it completely so the bandage will stay on. Could you just wrap the ball of the foot, leaving the back toe out, instead of the entire leg? The wound looks good & appears to be healing. When the bandage is off, she doesn't bite it right away, so maybe there is one area that is very sensitive & that is what sets her off biting it. If there was some way to put a protective cap over the wound so there is no presure on it & keep it on with the bandage, that might help. I don't know how you would do it though.

[biccio]

I did use hydrogen peroxide, is it so bad for the skin?

Today she quietly rested at the bottom of the cage, trying few times to remove the bandage (which luckily resisted).

She does not look too bad, nor too good, but at least she ate in the morning (about same schedule of her healthy sister). I did her some water with multivitamin. She seems a little sad today...probably for not being able to remove the bandage.

[MiaCarter]

biccio --- Hydrogen peroxide can damage the tissue. (You can see this if you put some on your finger for a minute or two. The skin will turn white - that's dead skin cells.)

So it's best to do it at half strength -- 1 part water and 1 part hydrogen peroxide. That's a bit gentler.

Normally I'd say skip it. But if she's mouthing her foot, then I would disinfect since the wound is still very open it seems.

You could also use another type of disinfectant. I use Bactine spray. It's a pain relieving spray that disinfects and it's not as harsh as hydrogen peroxide.

[wildbird]

It's great she's eating! I wouldn't use hydrogen peroxide again though, as it tends to burn. It sounds like you are giving her good care. Every day is a day toward recovery.

[Hilary]

I've never successfully been able to bandage. Even when I've had to amputate I just stuck with bacitracin ointment (and antibiotics in the water for the first couple of days). If you stop using the hydrogen peroxide and she just seems to be fussing with the bandage you may want to leave it off longer and see how she does. So good to see that she's improving!