Weight Loss

[AliAZ77]

Hi all. As many know, Linus was diagnosed with Aspergillosis and has been hospitalized now for 2 weeks. He has lost a tremendous amount of weight (390 down to 258 yesterday) however has resumed eating as normal. Yet, he is not putting on weight as we would like. Any thoughts on why this might be? Have been asking my vet but really haven't received a solid explanation. Wondering if it might be his medication? Anyone else have similar experience? Thanks.

[judygram]

I don't know why your avian vet won't explain this further, he should be giving you some suggestions for putting some weight on him but maybe it will come in time, does the vet seem concerned about his weight? It is understandable that he would lose weight being sick and it may take a while for him to put it back on, I would question the vet for a better explanation.

[Dave007]

This type of illness causes much weight loss. Getting back to normal ( weight wise) will take a long time especially because your bird is a grey. In general, Greys aren't known to gain weight even if they're fed fatty foods. They can however lose weight easily and it takes different amounts of time for the weight to return depending upon what the weight loss was caused by. A grey may get the weight back if what caused it was a minor problem. What your bird has isn't minor. It requires different medications and most important, antibiotics which can prohibit weight gain.

Different vets deal with the problem in a variety of ways but no matter what method is used, it will involve antibiotics and other anti-fungal medications. The main thing the vet is probably doing is trying to prevent further spreading of the illness to other organs. This type of illness will take quite a while to calm down and there's a good chance that when your bird gets well, not all the weight that was lost will fully return. That doesn't mean that your bird will be sick, it's only because the drugs that are used will prevent full weight gain. There's also a possibility that the illness may reacur and drugs will need to be given again.

Human example---a person may have internal growths and the problem is treated with medication and removal of those growths. But that person will have to get reexamined periodically to see if the growths reappear and if they do, the healing process( including medications and growth removal) needs to be done over again. Many women here will understand exactly what I'm talking about concerning growths.

 

Reopen the Health Room area. I put in a big post explaining this illness in more detail. It'll show you the whole process of diagnosis and treatment methods and lengths of time that treatment is used.

Edited February 18, 2011 by Dave007