Hi guys,

I've got a member on a Parrot Forum is asking about Uterine Rupture in a budgie and since we don't have any active members with budgie knowledge I said I'd post the question here.

 

 

 

"I lost an older exhibition budgie hen (around 6 years old at least, was older when I bought her) to uterine rupture about a year ago. Now I've got another one, about the same age, showing signs of the same thing. I realize the implications that she was bred too long or under bad conditions. I only wish I could change that now. Has anyone here had experience with this sort of thing who can give me any tips on preventing this? (extra diet supplements or anything) I'm just trying to keep her comfortable now."

I am so sorry

 

I had an old hen (10 yrs) get egg bound with prolapse, it didn't rupture, but her uterus came out with the egg still inside. I rushed her straight to the vet to be put to sleep - i couldn't bare to see her suffer

 

I don't know why my hen laid an egg.. i wasn't breeding back then - it just happened and it was very sad

 

I hope you can find your answers and i hope you friends hen is going to be okay (((Hugs)))

Edited March 27, 200817 yr by **Liv**

check this out and see if it helps

 

http://ocw.tufts.edu/Content/5/lecturenotes/215765

sad...sorry... I dont know know anything on that so im not particularly useful

I was so worried when I read the thread title! Immediate emergency if the actual rupture is happening presently. So sorry to hear of it

 

Uterine rupture is usually secondary to egg binding - they strain so hard to get the egg out, or the egg puts so much pressure on the uterine wall that it dies and weakens. Infection of the reproductive tract can also cause it to weaken.

 

What exactly are the 'signs' your friend has spoken of, and how was it diagnosed the first time? Uterine rupture is generally something you can't really tell from the outside (unless it's hanging outside the body.. most often the bird looks like it gets better and then dies suddenly). Signs of egg binding usually occur first.

 

From one of my assignments:

 

Egg binding and dystocia

Predisposing factors

• Oviduct muscle dysfunction (metabolic disease of calcium; selenium or vitamin E deficiency)
  
• Malformed egg (misshapen, soft shelled - due to calcium deficiency)
  
• Excessive egg production (depleting calcium reserves)
  
• Nutritional insufficiency
  
• Metritis (infection of the uterus)
  
• Previous oviduct damage/infection
  
• Obesity, lack of exercise
  
• Neoplasia (lipoma, oviduct tumour) or persistent cystic right oviduct
  
• Concurrent stress
  
• Genetics
  
• Inappropriate nesting
  
• Senility
  
• First egg
  
• Breeding out of season
  

Your friend should correct any of these that they think could be contributing. How is the calcium? She/he should give a supplement (calcivet) if they haven't already.

 

The little one should be taken to the vet just to be sure. The avian vet will be able to figure out if it's an egg-related problem, due to some infection or something else.

Edited March 27, 200817 yr by Chrysocome

doesn't sound good... Please keep us posted if you can about how it turns out. :budgiedance:

 

 

P.S. I hope you told your friend to join our great informative forum...

Calcium, I would say would be the major one to look out for as calcium is required for the muscles to contract. With out calcium muscles cannot move. Calcium is also required to send nerve impulses from nerve to nerve or nerve to muscle.

Thus a bird (or any animal) deficient in calcium is not able to contact its uterus as easily and as time goes on and they continue to struggle they use up more calcium until they cannot push no more. Calcium deficiencies can come about from a lack of calcium in the diet or overuse of calcium, which would be the case in extended periods of breeding, or problems with metabolising calcium properly, such as problems in the parathyroid gland (which can be caused by any number of things), or problems with uptake. With Cacium also comes the Vitamin D which is needed for calcium metabolism.

 

A prolapsed uterus isn't the end of life for a bird. Saffy had a prolapse, luckily she did so while she was at the hospital and the vet successfully operated on her and put the uterus back inside. She has weak abdominal muscles now though, which is a lack of calcium thing and her toenails are growing fast so it looks like she may have liver problems which could be the reason for Saffy's calcium problems.

When I asked her what the symptoms were this is what she posted:

 

The most obvious sign is an enlarged abdomen, and the hen is less energetic, and moody. If you feel the abdomen, you can feel it is spongy, not hard like with egg binding. From what I've seen, they act a little like when they are egg bound, but not anywhere near as bad. Sometimes it happens as a direct result of egg binding but my first hen had never been egg bound while I had her, so I guess it was because she was a worn out breeder. The swelling gradually grows, and the hen usually dies. I think there may be a surgery, to save the bird, but it is more of a risk than it is worth, I think.

Shoot, now I'm getting worried, because Saffy is being like that now, but she is eating, drinking and pooping normally with no obvious signs of distress. Just a swollen abdomen, that is squishy. I'm away from my vet at the moment so I can't take her in. I have however upped her calcium and she has a good appetite.

So sorry to hear that Sailorwolf. I hope you can get her to the vet soon.

 

From my text book:

A convex bulging of the abdominal wall is indicative of a space-occupying mass (eg, egg, neoplasm, ascites, enlarged organ). With liver enlargement, ascites, proventricular or ventricular distension or displacement, egg development, egg-related peritonitis or mass formation, the abdomen may appear distended, doughy and convex.

 

Edit - better put some of those terms into plain english.

neoplasm = cancer, ascites = fluid in the abdomen, ventriculus = stomach, peritonitis = infection of the inner abdominl wall

Edited March 30, 200817 yr by Chrysocome

I know this is going a little off topic. Saffy seems to be doing quite well. Apparently it has been going on for awhile (my parents were looking after her), but she appears otherwise normal. Her only problems are that because of the expanded abdomen, breathing is a little more difficult for her, but she gets along quite fine. When I last took her into the vet, he said she had weakened abdominal walls and this could be the reason for it now bulging, with out the muscles pushing back, her abdomen has filled. However she is pooping and eating and drinking and moving around normally, so I am not hugely worried at the moment. I'm taking her and her friends back home in two days and then I can get her to the vet. Just with the big journey in the way it makes it a little hard to do anything sooner.

I hope she'll be okay...