This video shows a surgical lung endoscopic examination in a 2kg Carpet Python (Morelia spilota) that was suffering from chronic lower respiratory tract disease.

The long narrow trachea makes the use of a standard flexible bronchoscope difficult in snakes. In this technique a long rigid endoscope is surgically inserted in the air sac region of the caudal lung.

Snakes have a faveolar lung structure, unlike the mammalian alveolar lung, with most of the spongy faveolar structure surrounding the lumen of the cranial lung, gradual reducing caudally to a thin membranous air sac. Some organs can be seen through the thin air sac walls.

In this examination no fungal plaques, parasites, or granulomas were evident, just small beads of mucopurulent material that were sampled for bacterial culture and sensitivity

First published: Thu, Sep 16 2010