The New Bird Exam
by Joel Blumberg, DVM, Santa Rosa Veterinary Hospital

This article is reprinted from Pet Bird Report Issue #24 and may not be reprinted without the written permission of Sally Blanchard or the PBIC, Inc. Contact us for permission.

Congratulations on getting your new bird! You are to be commended for carefully checking out the personalities and needs of the various species and selecting just the right bird for you. You have the right size cage all set up with the correct perches, food bowls, water containers, and toys. You've discussed diet with your avian and you have the proper foods in stock. Your subscriptions to the Pet Bird Report and Bird Talk have already begun.

Now, all you need to do is to make sure you've got a healthy bird. Hopefully, you obtained the seventy-two hour health guarantee which is becoming the standard for people who sell birds commercially. The usual terms require that a veterinarian examine the bird and collect laboratory samples within seventy-two hours of your taking possession. This is a reasonable time frame. If disease is detected within seventy-two hours, it is a fair assumption that he bird was ill prior to your taking possession.

Illness detected after seventy-two hours could be due to factors in the new environment for which the previous caretaker is not responsible. Depending on the test being run, some laboratory result may not be known for up to three weeks. However, provided that the samples are obtained within the seventy-two hour time frame, the guarantee should be in effect.

Determining Health

Guaranteed or not, it is very important that you have the health of your new bird checked by an avian veterinarian. OK, so how do we go about determining that a bird is healthy? Since these critters are so smart and so many of them can talk, why not just ask how they feel? After all, if we ask a human how he or she feels, we can get an answer that goes on for hours. If we ask a cat or dog we'll be answered with pathetic expressions (well rehearsed!), moans and groans, lethargic behavior, etc. But, when we ask birds how they feel, they all say, "I'm just fine. Go mind your own business!" Sick birds will lie to us and claim to be healthy. They will do everything in their power to look and act normal.

Only when birds are pretty bad off will they be unable to cover up the fact that they are feeling really crummy. The reason that birds don't let on that they're feeling lousy is that in the wild a sick bird can be driven out of its flock, or worse yet, can be picked out by a predator as a good choice for lunch. It's no wonder then that our birds will do everything possible to mask signs of illness! However, even without a bird's cooperation, we are able to evaluate its health. We just have to look below the surface - which is the reason why laboratory test are performed so much more often on birds than on mammals. The decision about how thoroughly your bird is examined and tested is based on how much value you place on the bird, monetarily and/or emotionally.

If you own other birds, then you must also consider how much you value them. You need to be aware of the risk of disease transmission from the newcomer to the established residents. On behalf of my fellow avian vets, I urge you not to begrudge the costs involved in a new bird exam. You should factor in veterinary fees just the same as you did the purchase price, cage cost, the expenses for food, treats, says, etc., etc. I will now list procedures which avian veterinarians use to evaluate a bird's health.

HISTORY

Before even looking at a bird a lot can be learned by knowing its background. Where was the bird hatched? How was it raised? How many and what kind of other birds has it been exposed to? How many people and facilities have handled the bird? What has been its diet in the past? What is its diet now? Has the bird or any of its companions been sick? Has the bird ever been exposed to smokers? Has the bird been receiving any medication? These are a few of the 108 possible questions that can be part of the history taking. From this information an avian vet can get a "feel" for potential health problems.

PHYSICAL EXAM

Even though a sick bird will do everything in its power to act and look healthy, its masquerade is not always successful. Sometimes a thorough physical examination can detect tell-tale signs of disease. A few matted feathers here, a dab of discharge there, a change in feather growth, color that's not quite right, improper weight, lumps and bumps, wheezes and sneezes, and other stuff can give us a clue that a bird just ain't right.

LABORATORY TESTS

As you've already reamed, birds and vets are in a continuous contest over finding the hidden disease. However, we vets have one huge advantage in this game, and that is lab tests. Even the most clever avian faker can't control his blood cells, chemistry, or immune system. By delving into the internal workings of our patients, persistent avian vets can find abnormalities and evidence of disease. I'll list some of the more common tests performed as part of a New Bird Exam. I'll explain what the test is designed to do, it's usefulness, and its limitations.

Droppings can be separated into the three components of feces, urine, and urates. The feces can be checked for color, consistency, and parasites. The urine can be checked for clarity, color, certain chemicals, and microscopic elements. The urates can be observed for amount and color.

Complete blood count (CBC) is an examination of the condition and numbers of each of the cell types which are carried in the blood. The CBC is very valuable in detecting many infections, anemia, some poisonings, allergy blood parasites, and a few kinds of cancer. Although the CBC can often tell us if a bird is sick, it rarely tells us why. Some infections do not produce changes in the CBC at all. Nevertheless, the CBC is an excellent screening procedure in birds and is basic to a New Bird Exam.

Blood chemistries are a group of tests designed to measure the amount of chemicals produced by various organs and transferred into the liquid portion of the blood. Depending upon how many chemicals are selected to be measured in a "lab panel," the health of specific organs can be determined. The more tests that are included in a panel, the more precise our evaluation of organ function will be. As veterinarians are reaming more about avian disease processes, we are better able to customize our lab panels for different species of birds. These species specific panels give us more useful information at less cost to the owner.

Blood chemistries do have a few limitations. Some conditions don't affect those chemistries which are included in routine lab panels. An abnormal finding may be caused by more than one organ. Routine lab panels do not always disclose the reason an organ is misbehaving. Sometimes more involved testing is required. Even so, for the purpose of screening the health of new birds, laboratory techniques are available which give us a wealth of information on a tiny amount of blood.

Cultures and Gram's stains of the mouth and vent will detect bacteria, yeast, and fun- infections. Cultures and Gram's stains also evaluate the necessary normal bacteria. This procedure is useful in assessing the respiratory, digestive, urinary, and reproductive tracts. In general, the problems detected by cultures and Gram's stains are the ones we usually can treat most successfully.

Psittacosis (chlamydia) is an infectious disease which can affect many organ systems in a bird. It especially likes to wreak havoc with the liver or respiratory system. Psittacosis poses a real problem in that not all infected birds demonstrate the dramatic signs of serious illness. The new bird can be incubating the infection and not be showing signs of it yet. Some birds can have low grade in-apparent infections. Others maybe perfectly "healthy" carriers. Man avian researchers suspect that, once a bird is infected with the Psittacosis organism, it never totally gets rid of it. Under condition of stress an infected bird can come down with the full blown disease and/or shed the organism, thereby posing a threat to other birds - or to you and your family. Psittacosis can also occur in humans. A variety of tests exist to detect Psittacosis. Each test has its ad vantages and limitations.

The choice of which test to run will depend on the age, species, source, and general health of the bird. By careful evaluation of the bird and its background, an avian veterinarian can test for Psittacosis with & good degree of accuracy. Polyoma virus does serious damage to a bird's immune system Hemorrhages can occur anywhere in the bird with devastating results.

The disease produces extremely high mortality in incubating eggs and chicks. Survivors, or a bird in-0fected at an older age, can become carriers. The most common test for Polyoma is per formed on a special swab taken from the cloaca. If the virus is being shed, even in extremely small amounts, the test can detect it. The major drawback is, if a carrier doesn't happen to be shedding the virus at the time the sample is taken, the test will come back negative. However, a bird undergoing stress is much more likely to shed the virus. A bird that is being relocated from one owner to another will be stressed.

The seventy-two hour time frame of the New Bird Exam is an ideal time to look for the Polyoma virus. Psittacine Beak and Feather Disease (PBFD) is another virus that does bad things to the immune system. Babies can become sick and die quickly. Older birds can lose resistance and develop serious secondary infections. The typical chronic form of the disease produces malformed feathers and beaks. The bird gets progressively worse with each molt until, in some cases, the bird can be entirely bald. Healthy appearing carriers can occur in birds infected with the PBFD virus. A very good blood test has been developed for PBFD.

The New Bird Exam is one of the most important events in the life of your bird. This is an ideal time to assess a bird's health. Serious problems, with warrantee implications, can be detected before you've become too attached. Lesser problems can be dealt with right away before they become bigger or jeopardize your other birds. Hopefully, no problems will be found at all, and you will enjoy your new companion in good health for many years!

If this article helped you and you appreciated the information, The Companion Parrot Quarterly continues to have in-depth, practical articles such as this one. PLEASE SUBSCRIBE