Urgent Care :: Follow-Up Question on Treating Shell Rot

[LKitsch]

I posted here before. I am treating one of my RES's for shell rot. I went to the vet, the area has been cleaned and fungus removed, the turtle is in dry dock 20-plus hours a day, is bathed in clean tap water, and a prescription anti-fungal is applied twice daily. On the vet's and pharmacist's recommendations, I am using old fashioned iodine as an anti-bacterial twice a day, too.

It's been a week, and the area looks like a scab now. I'm not sure how much of that is the turtle and how much is the color of the iodine. The area is hard to the touch and no new fungus appears to be growing, nor is it spreading.

My question is this: how much longer do I need to keep the turtle isolated and in dry dock? Another week? A month? I know it can take months for the shell to completely heal, but when can I safely return her to the pond before that? I'm sure she is not happy right now.

[SpotsMama]

What does your vet say?

[LKitsch]

A week or two, depending on how it looks. So the exact timing is up to me, and I could use some advice on that.

[marisa]

But no one here can see how it looks now or compare it to what it looked liked before (I thought the turtle just had fungus?). The vet said a week or two? The timing really is up to you. If the shell is looking good and you want to be cautious, wait the two weeks.

[LKitsch]

Isn't shell rot and fungus the same thing?

[SpotsMama]

Shell rot can be a fungal or bacterial infection, or a combination of the two.

[LKitsch]

Oh, I see---shell rot is the condition and either fungus or bacteria are the cause, or both. Well, it is definitely some sort of shell rot, and I am covering all bases by giving both anti-bacterial and anti-fungal. It just seems so hard to figure out how well it is healing.

[SpotsMama]

Yes, you said it well - shell-rot is the condition.

My turtle had shell fungus and it spread all over but didn't get too deep. After I started working on fixing it, what I had to settle for was that it stopped getting worse. Then, gradually, Spot shed the damaged parts of his shell and began looking better. After about a year, virtually all of the damage has been shed and he's looking good! But it's a very slow process.

[marisa]

A turtle can have shell rot without fungus and fungus without shell rot or both. Shell rot can either be wet or dry; the causes can be different, the treatment is similar.