A girl that wanted to see
It pains me how easily I could have missed that something where wrong with her eyes. It was such a slight thing that could have gone unoticed. When I started to think about so many puzzle pieces fell into place about her behavior.
It all started with a just glimmer how the light fell on to her eyes. First time I tought it was a illusion of the eye. She had like a grey fog to her eyes. I did not think much about it then. She ate, drank and acted normal.
The second time just a few weeks later I picked her up and saw that grey fog again, now it was much more obvious. Another thing became more clear to be, I have seen this type of grey fog before in eyes: in old dogs. Realizing this, I know something is wrong.
"Have you checked if the pupils reacts to light?" where the most hepful comment I got. With my amature veterinary skills, I tested and they did not. This was the point that made me decide to make an appoiment at the Vet.
Next tought was that often I have found her alone in their run latley, just sitting by her self. I tought then it was just cause her sister where broody. She could not keep up with the flock when free ranging and she also missed if I offerd her treats.
One sentence the Vet said when she came back after the tests with Vanessa, sums all my toughts up "You where right"
The vet explained to me that she most likley does not have much vision at all. The tests showed that the pupil does not react to light at all in the right eye but she did squint to the light in the left one, that showed that she could see some in that one.
The biggest issue tho, the pressure in the right eye was at 54 (a normal pressure lays around 17-20). This gave her the diagnose of glaucoma
Glaucoma has the symtoms of intense eye pain, that can cause nausea and vomiting
The next problem, no pressure medicine for the eye have really been tested how they work on chickens. So there is no way of knowing what works and what side effects they could have.
How I got it to explained that Brinzolamide (one pressure medicine for glaucoma) works on parrots but could poisonous to Pigeons. So what catagory does chicken fall under?
The vet prepared me that she most likley would need a operation to remove the eye, but for the time being that it would be best that we saw an eye specialist where they could look at the eyes more and advice us on a course what medicine to use.
This eye specialist have never seen a chicken but have seen several parrots. Lucky enough they like to take the "special cases" so we did not have to wait long before we get an appoiment just 4 days later.
I do not actully remeber what they said about the right eye more than that, what the other vet figured out the pressure is really high.
In dogs, they advice that a high pressure needs to be fixed within 30 minutes for it to not be any vision loss
I started giving her breakfast and dinner that I made specially for her. I mixed togheter foods adapted for more sick birds and added food that are supposed to boost eye health.
Eye boosting recipie:
Child/kid foodsmash Carrot
Child/kid foodsmash Strawberry, blueberry and banana.
Soaked chicken food.
Eggfood
Ida Plus Milb & Weg
Vetark Critical Care
(sometimes a raw egg)
Then the pressure stopped at 42 for over a month.
The talk came up what our options where if the pressure stayed like this:
- Experimental medicine where you destory the eye. Since no Vet in Sweden will remove a bird eye due to their complex anatomy.
- Another type of eye pressure drops.
- Euthanasia
The day of trying the new drops, the Vet messured the pressure yet again before the drops. Something amazing had happend! Her pressure had gone from 42 down to 37!
I explained that I had giving her "special meals". Both me and the Vet tought this could have boosted her healing, with antioxidants and vitamins.
We still went with the new drops, sitting in the vet office for 1 hour with the Vet so kindly checking up on us once in a while and checking her breathing so was not any side effects.
Latanoprost eyedrops could have astma as a side effect.
30 is considerd acceptable levels in a animal with glaucoma.
The biggest diffrence at this visit was her behavior. She have been so stressed at every visit, panting. Now she was so calm she almost fell asleep in my lap.
When the vet came to test the eyes, she brought some broody saz! That says alot, that she had that confidence.
She will stay on the exact same medication her life out with Brinzolamide drops 3 times a day, Latanoprost drops 1 a day and antiinflamatory painrelif 2 times a day.
She no longer need the breakfast and dinner and eats all by her own. She still hesitate to free range but does get around much better.
Took inspiration from a instagram account and gave her a hen saddle thats bright pink with make shift predator eyes to easier keep a track of her when she free range.
Unfortantly soon after we got her pressure down to 30 the first time it started slowly going back up again, all the way to 42. We where almost back where we started.
We increased the latanprost drops, this seemed to give the pressure a kick! My vetrinarian wanted to add something more to make the pressure go down better, this is when the real breakthrue came.
We added diclofenac eyedrops. The pressure skyrocketed down! It has been steady at 24 in pressure now.
She has really adapted to blind life and finds food, water, nestboxes everything with no issue. She still do not want to free range.
The Vet tought that biggest chance is that she have gotten a peck on the head once in her life time to cause this damage. Reflecting what she told me about glaucoma in the first visit and her behavior from day one I think she had some sort of eye problems already when I bought her.
What made me choose her, I saw one lonley girl standing in the corner, starring into the wall. From the past month before the diagnos something changed to speed up the eye problems.
