Popeye caused blindness in my Auratus....permanent?

[jaimoe]

I have an adult female auratus that I put in a hospital tank about 2 months ago to treat it for bloat and popeye. I gave it the metro treatment and the bloat went away and the eyes stopped swelling, but I've kept the fish in the hospital tank because it still has cloudy eyes and it appears to be blind. It can tell if someone walks up to the tank and can tell when you lift the hood to put food in, but it cannot find the food, and has to wait until the food falls to the bottom, where it just sifts through all the sand trying to find the food. I kept up medication for another week but it still didn't clear up. I figured I would just leave it be in the hospital tank and see what happens, thinking maybe it was a permanent condition. Well two months in the hospital tank and it still has the cloudy eyes(cataracts?). Has anyone ever heard of popeye causing permanent blindness? Are there any medicines out there that are good for solving this particular problem? I'd hate to have to keep this fish in the hospital tank for the rest of it's life.....but I can't return it to the big tank in this condition, it would just end up starving to death.

 

[piranha45]

are its eyes looking healthy, otherwise? is there still medication in the tank? if so, do a huge water change and see if the cloudiness clears up in the presence of non medicated water.

 

[jaimoe]

Yeah other than the cloudiness the eyes look OK. No more swelling or anything. And I stopped medicating about a month or so....I did a massive water change at that time and have done my standard 25% weekly water change since then. I was hoping it would go away on it's own but it doesn't seem like it's gonna happen!

 

[guppy]

Fish sometimes get tiny bubbles or white cell occlusions in the eyes after illness but if the fish is otherwise healthy it ussually clears ins week or so. Some diseases can be followed by cataracts which are unfortunately permanent.

 

[piranha45]

I think the best bet for that fish now is euthanasia.... put it in a container, put the container in the freezer.

 

[sleepyflight]

gonna have to agree w/P45.... If the eyes glaze and don't recover atleast to a noticable degree it's usually perm.

 

[tropicalfishguy]

She isn't able to fins food at all. I have a large female red devil that lost one of her eyes completly, and the other one is 90-95% gone. She was beaten pretty badly from a male. I kept her in a seperate tank until the wounds heal and I now have her in my large tank. She doesn't have any problems getting food, only thing I find now is she has become light sensitive. Only comes out during dusk, but other than that very healthy and active. All hope might not be lost on your fish, but its a personal call.