Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My adult male recently got a prolapse hemipene after he mated with one of my females. We brought him into a vet that was recommended by 3 of the local vet hospitals. After cleaning the infected hemipene, the vet quoted us at a little over $1000 for the amputation of the prolapsed hemipene. Me and my girlfriends jaw dropped. We told the vet that we couldn't afford it and she understood. She gave us antibiotics to put him on and told us to keep it wet until we got it taken care of. We went home and started calling every vet in the phone book. We found a vet that said he would do it for about $200. I hate to shop around for stuff like this but I found $1000 to be ridiculous; we were expecting to pay $200-250 tops. Has anyone ever had this done? What did it cost you?

Please don't lecture me about shopping around when it comes to my pets health. My girlfriend and I are both students and living on our own so we are broke.
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Leopard Geckos
1.0.0 Tremper Albino - Turbo
0.1.0 Blazing Blizzard - Blizzy
0.1.0 Tangerine - Daisy
0.2.0 Tangerine carrot-tail baldy - Sunshine, Amber
1.1.0 Hi-yellow - Tiger Lily, Ginger

I had a $600 male prolapse his first attempt at breeding. Luckily even after an amputation he is a good breeder. I just don't work him as much as the rest.
I paid $300 for an overnight stay, emergency late night visit, with the amputation the following day. It sounds like they are a little pricy.
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Brian
www.windycitygeckos.com

Do you know how your prolapse happened? What kind of substrate was he on?

I'm thinking mine happened because my male was on calcisand and the hemipene got covered in sand before he retracted it so it got covered. We are in the process of switching to astro turf from home depot in all 4 of our leo enclosures at the recommendation of the vet.

Here's the breakdown of costs:

Reptile consultation, $95
CBC/Chemscreen, $105.00
Propofol Aensth. Induc., $65
Isofluorane mask anesth, $90
Isofluorane additional, $90
Amputation of hemipene, $200
Sterile surg. packdisposal, $36
Surgical tech II EX, $80
ECG Monitoring with anesthesia, $25
Pain management-injections, $50
Reptile hospitalization, $96
Exotics evaluation A, $82
Medication to be dispensed, $60

Total $1074.00
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Leopard Geckos
1.0.0 Tremper Albino - Turbo
0.1.0 Blazing Blizzard - Blizzy
0.1.0 Tangerine - Daisy
0.2.0 Tangerine carrot-tail baldy - Sunshine, Amber
1.1.0 Hi-yellow - Tiger Lily, Ginger

Most likely and calci sand is the worst substrate for a leo. You should use washed play sand if you insist on using sand but sand in general in not a good substrate for leos. They will get impacted, especially calci sand because they seek the cacluim out of the sand which is horrible. You should provide a pure calcuim dish for them and i would HIGHLY suggest you remove the sand and Use TILE, PAPER TOWELS,NEWSPAPER, or Repti Carpet.

ive personally never had to deal with a prolapse, but i agree 1000 was way overboard. shopping around for a better price on something like that is totally understandable. i mean, it seems like with those kinds of prices, you can help your animal or not. isnt it crazy how much vet bills can be?

LeoLady: All of my leo enclosures have calcium dishes and over the 6 years of owning leos I've never had a problem with calci-sand impactions. Personally, I think calci-sand is "ok" for adults but never to be used with babies.

Pythonchick: Yes I was totally surprised. My gf said she never even saw a vet bill that high for a dog that she owned. And they wanted $1000 to take care of a $30 gecko... Crazy right?
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Leopard Geckos
1.0.0 Tremper Albino - Turbo
0.1.0 Blazing Blizzard - Blizzy
0.1.0 Tangerine - Daisy
0.2.0 Tangerine carrot-tail baldy - Sunshine, Amber
1.1.0 Hi-yellow - Tiger Lily, Ginger

Still is a really bad idea and i would never use sand personally and especially not calci sand. Good luck

I also thought you said you switched it to astro turf? Which i personally don't know if i would use because it may tend to bother there feet a bit.

My vet had sample of the exact astro turf to buy from home depot so I figured it would be safe since it was recommended by a reptile vet.
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Leopard Geckos
1.0.0 Tremper Albino - Turbo
0.1.0 Blazing Blizzard - Blizzy
0.1.0 Tangerine - Daisy
0.2.0 Tangerine carrot-tail baldy - Sunshine, Amber
1.1.0 Hi-yellow - Tiger Lily, Ginger

I just think it is weird that's all maybe i am just thinking of different astroturf i dunno. I'll just stick to paper towels, they are cheapest, and always available and i dont have to go to the pet store to get it. I have to go to a store yes but i have to go to that store 1 a week regardless. haha Let me know how that works out. I definelty want to know....Thanks!!

We got it taken care of today and it only took about 30 minutes. The vet was really nice and moved us up from 3:00 to 12:00 because of the weather. He felt bad that we had to drive back and forth so he did the surgery right away so we could take him with us. It only cost us $170 including a medication to apply to the hemipene area.
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Leopard Geckos
1.0.0 Tremper Albino - Turbo
0.1.0 Blazing Blizzard - Blizzy
0.1.0 Tangerine - Daisy
0.2.0 Tangerine carrot-tail baldy - Sunshine, Amber
1.1.0 Hi-yellow - Tiger Lily, Ginger