Bornavirus

[anonFinch]

Hey all,
Posting for the first time, not sure if this is the correct place so apologies in advance.
Im only posting because I am out of idea/options/my own research has come up with dead ends.
Is anyone else out there dealing with their parrot having Avian Bornavirus, if so, has anyone heard of any trial medication or anything of that sort.
A bit of context; I have a 2 year old galah who was diagnosed with BV a few months ago after losing weight and becoming lethargic. He was started on Rheumocam, which he has been receptive to thus far but no further than having much more energy and not being lethargic anymore. Yes, we have an avian vet. Yes, many other viral tests and blood tests were preformed before BV was diagnosed with a blood and PCR test. It was only tested last as he did not show typical signs of BV. In the words of said avian vet, he unfortunately has a very bad case of it, especially so early on in life. Yes, he is on a healthy diet of fresh chop in the morning and TOPs pellets in the afternoon/evening, the only change has been more caloric foods mixed in for weight retention (boiled potatoes, bird safe wheat noodles, rice noodles etc) as per vet instructions.

tl;dr Is anyone else out there dealing with their parrot having Avian Bornavirus (earlier classified as Parrot wasting disease)? How do you deal with it? Have other Avian vets given different medications? Is anyone aware of other medical trials to cure BV?

Thankyou, anonFinch.

 

[anonFinch]

Bit of a correction and some additional info;
I confused parrot wasting disease with macaw wasting disease and PDD, apologies on that one, I maybe have done too much research and things get scrambled.
He has both symptoms, neurological (poor balance, slight to good improvement after Rheumocam treatment, but not much to think it gone) and digestive symptoms (not keeping weight, BUT no undigested food in droppings. Which was the puzzling part and why it was tested so late).

A bit on how he is reacting to Rheumocam;
Neuro symptoms - slight improvement, but the virus worked its way so quickly that he has long lasting damage and will always have bad balance.
Digestive symptoms - weight jumps between 280g and 306g. We have successfully kept him above 290g for the past 2 or 3 months. But there are days where he will not eat much and weight plummets, obviously. He is weighted daily, first thing after waking up. Rheumocam has given him alot more energy and lethargy is not a concern for the moment.

I am aware that there is no cure. But once I start researching, theres no stopping. Plus after recently hearing another parrot beat the odds of PBFD, I had to research if there was any current info on Bornavirus.

 

[saxguy64]

Hello, and welcome to the Forums, although I'm so sorry it's under less than positive circumstances.

So, a few things ABV is unfortunately very common in domestic parrots, but not necessarily a death sentence. There are quite a few different strains of ABV, and the majority of them don't lead to PDD. One of mine is positive for ABV, but shows no symptoms, and I pray he never does. PBFD is something entirely different.

Sadly, it seems your bird is symptomatic of PDD, and that's a tough road ahead. I studied quite a bit as well when my guy was diagnosed. Unless there's been new developments recently, there is no cure, only treatment of the symptoms as they arise and worsen, to keep them as healthy and comfortable as possible until you can't anymore. How long the progression takes is kind of a wild card. Some progress very quickly, while others can go for several years. Regardless of how long, it's truly heartbreaking. There never seems to be enough time with our feather babies, the way they worm their way into our hearts. Sounds at least a little positive that there's no undigested food in his droppings.

I wish I had something better to offer besides prayers for you both, and hope for you to have more time with him. 🙏🙏🙏

 

[anonFinch]

Hello, and welcome to the Forums, although I'm so sorry it's under less than positive circumstances.

So, a few things ABV is unfortunately very common in domestic parrots, but not necessarily a death sentence. There are quite a few different strains of ABV, and the majority of them don't lead to PDD. One of mine is positive for ABV, but shows no symptoms, and I pray he never does. PBFD is something entirely different.

Sadly, it seems your bird is symptomatic of PDD, and that's a tough road ahead. I studied quite a bit as well when my guy was diagnosed. Unless there's been new developments recently, there is no cure, only treatment of the symptoms as they arise and worsen, to keep them as healthy and comfortable as possible until you can't anymore. How long the progression takes is kind of a wild card. Some progress very quickly, while others can go for several years. Regardless of how long, it's truly heartbreaking. There never seems to be enough time with our feather babies, the way they worm their way into our hearts. Sounds at least a little positive that there's no undigested food in his droppings.

I wish I had something better to offer besides prayers for you both, and hope for you to have more time with him. 🙏🙏🙏

I am very sorry to hear your little one has the same diagnosis, and I hope for the same to you. From what I have researched, there are many that live out long and fulfilled lives even with this diagnosis, so my fingers are crossed for you!!!!

Yes, I am very aware PBFD is a completely different thing. The reason I had mention it was because of the case Id seen recently where a cockatoo had beat the odds with experimental/trial treatment. Hence why it got me to try and research more as to if similar things are happening with ABV/PDD.
Im still learning the abbreviations and differences, since our vet only simplified it to "bornavirus", so apologies if i mixed some things up!
We have been told the very same thing by the vet. Because the virus worked so quickly we didnt even expect the positive-ish results that we are getting with Rheumocam. As well as being told to just take it one day at a time. So thats what we are doing. He will have a good and gappy life for as long as we can provide it.

But that doesnt mean the reseach should stop there. I believe in meditation and treatment, which is why its surprising to me that theres so little still known about how to treat bornavirus.

Thankyou very much for your reply, I do hope that maybe out there ther is something that can still be further done!

 

[kme3388]

Hi there, I also have a parrot with ABV. He had all of the tests done as well. He came from a shelter, and was around a significant amount of other birds. I was informed that most flocks indeed have ABV. It’s not deadly like the PDD from my understanding. PDD I came across in my research of ABV. PDD looks so heartbreaking, painful, and deadly. It’s a heartbreaking thing to even read about.

I’ve never seen undigested food or anything like that from my parrot that was diagnosed with ABV. I mainly made an appointment with a vet for my parrots feather plucking. He was ripping out feathers, and to the point of self mutilation. He also had an over grown beak, and nails. I wasn’t comfortable trimming them myself as I was so unfamiliar with Ekkie’s. I’d only had Nico a month at this time. Yes I did notice he had a lot of feathers missing. I seen the stress bars in them. He was doing some serious feather destruction. For a new person walking into this situation… oh boy!!! I was OVERWHELMED. The only odd thing was Nico was missing feathers around his nostrils where they can’t pluck. Granted he rubs his nostrils hard against surfaces. Sometimes I wonder if they have allergies like us. I want to rub my nose like that too when farmers are taking out crops. I just know better 😂😂😂 Anyways Nico’s vet ran some bloodwork that came back negative for PDD but positive for ABV. It sounds to me like Nico is sensitive from what his vet said.

This is a great community here on the parrot forum. There is so much support. Please do share photos of your parrot, and introduce him/her.