A common snapping turtle, “Pleb”, presented to us after being hit by a car several months ago. He had a very severe injury to his carapace. The lung was actually visible through the wound. We tried several treatments which had varying degrees of effectiveness. Eventually, we treated his wounds with vacuum assisted wound care (V.A.C. therapy). This entails placing a silver impregnated bandage over the wound and then incorporating a continuous suction on the wound. That is not a misspelling, silver actually has antimicrobrial properties and we have a variety of wound care products that have silver impregnated in them. A special sponge with a plastic suction tube is place over the silver bandage. Then, multiple layers of a sticky bandage called Tegaderm are placed on the area so that there are no leaks detectable. This is the hardest and most frustrating part of the bandage placement. It is all worth it in the end. Dramatic results were seen in a fairly short period of time with Pleb. Aquatic turtles present challenges with this method of therapy because they must be kept out of water when the suction is on. Stress reduction is a very important when treating any wildlife patient. To reduce stress, Pleb was placed in water to eat for part of the day and the remainder of the day he would be “dry docked” and the vacuum applied. We typically used the VAC therapy for 5 days and then gave him a break for a few days and then repeated the treatment again. Pleb’s wounds healed up great and he was recently released back to the wild in a beautiful wetland on Jane Bryson’s (Volunteer extraordinaire) property. We would like to thank Faith at the Kinetic Concepts, Inc (KCI) for being instrumental in providing the necessary equipment to perform V.A.C. therapy on our patients.
Sincerely,
Dr. Terry Norton
