Piperazine treatment

[A_gibbiceps]

I would appreciate some input concerning the use of Piperazine for treating internal parasites in Apistos. It has been my experience to treat fish before they stop eating. Since Piperazine needs to be ingested for it to be effective, I like to feed my Apistos with tiny bits of earthworms soaked in Piperazine for 30 minutes. Is anybody using this method to prevent internal parasites? And is Piperazine an effective broad spectrum dewormer for the most commonly occurring internal parasites in Apistos?
Anthony

 

[depthc]

Ive never heard of piperazine but what I have used for internal parasties has worked well. I use Seachem Metro which i usually soak in with frozen brine shrimp. But with metro the fish dont need to ingest the medicine you can add it to the water column and it will work fine. Ive treated a krib and she's as healthy as can be now. I might have to treat a few cacautoides real soon also and this medicine is def. what I'll use.

Andrew

 

[fishgeek]

a parasite is an organism which grow/lives and feeds on/in another organism

internal parasite's include many things

it seems to me that parasite in aquatic web language means something rather different to my understanding , ie not a virus , not a fungi not a bacteria , all of these things can be parasites

piperazine is a wormer or in more exact terms an antinematodal drug(round worms)

it is effective at treating non encysted nematodes , you are correct in suggesting that it needs to be ingested because it is poorly absorbed by most fish and acts locally in the gastrointestinal system to paralysis the nematodes so they die and are passed
it is not thought that nematdes are a comon problem in aquariums because they generally were thought to have complex life cysles(needing an intermediate host to complete)
lately research has shown that some nematodes can complete their lifecycle in a simple manner for a few generations

metronidazol is an antiprotozoal with antibiotic effects

asto your choice of wormer i have had good succes with levamisol
others suggest flubendazol as being useful, although reports of die off's in discuss are recorded

discus forums may have more information on choices of praziquantel, piperazine, flubendazol, fenbendazol, levamisol
or you may prefer to stick with what you can source and know

hth
andrew

 

[A_gibbiceps]

I recently brought my dog to the vet and asked him if I could get some levamisol. He looked into his books and said it wasn't available or has been replaced with another drug. Is there another trade name that it is carried under? He also mentioned that this is also similar to Advantage (for dogs) which is absorbed through the skin. Anyone tried these other types of meds? What about trichlorfon (Dylox)? I'd like to find a medication that would be added to the tank water and absorbed through the fishes skin.
Thanks
Anthony

 

[fishgeek]

advantage

it is nothing like levamisole , advantage is the trade name for a product called imidoclopramide
it is a insecticide that desn't seem to have the same toxic effects on fish and other aquaqutic veterbrates that most other insecticides have
although as it is new i am still cynical(trials are to my knowledge limited to trout-may be my knowledge that is poor here)

it will kill aquatic inveterbrates

did you mention why you wanted levamisole, or was the vet trying to sell you a product for the dog?
levamisol is still available and readily so, it is an old drug that medical departments do not still fully understand
it is used widely as an adjunct to chemotherapy in people and was never used much in small animal medicine , mainly agriculture so perhaps you hvae asked the wrong person

unfortunately i when training did not recieve much teaching on aquatic medicine , perhaps this is the same for most of my profession

most in water medications used in fish are absorbed directly through the gilss, this is not a novel application route for fish

andrew

 

[A_gibbiceps]

I had explained to the vet, that the levamisole was to be used for my fishkeeping hobby, not for my dog. Maybe you're right, he wasn't the best person to ask about this. Anyhow, what about using trichlorfon? some of my fish books suggest it's a good anti-parasite. I know that its an insecticide. Have you ever used it with Apistos?

Anthony

 

[Mike Wise]

Trichlorphon (Dylox) is an insecticide, I doubt that it will have much effect on worms.

 

[fishgeek]

sorry trichorphon is used in discus for insect/arthropod probs
it is an organophosphate medication

it has been recorded to be immunosuppressive in carp

no personal experience


what exactly are you looking for anthony

 

[A_gibbiceps]

I'd like to have some kind of medication on hand, when I run into a crisis situation. Especially, when a fish is clearly in trouble and has stopped eating altogether. A last chance effort to save it.
Anthony

 

[fishgeek]

sorry anthony , thats not quite exactly

1st step to treating is understanding what the cause is, this seems to be the hardest thing to do in fish(probably why most medications are combinations) shotgun theory

once we have an idea of cause then most medicatins can be given and absorbed through the gills into the blood stream(piperazine is just not well absorbed - metronidazol is just not particularly soluble)

there was a very good post about treatment of wild caught fish by someone on this list
discus are cichids from similar natural waters
discus being worth more monetarily(seem to have more written about medications) i find useful information on some discus forums DHP for instance

fish that are not eating and losing weight maybe suffering from so many things , thing people
nausea due to metabolic toxins accumulating because of kidney failure/liver disease(apparently something like 1/3rd of fish post mortems show fatty degeneration of the liver) mouth pain/tooth ache swallowing diffiulty, gut pain cramps colic blockage
pressure on the gastrointestinal tract from swellings in other organs internally
anaemia
tb
etc etc etc

this is what i found so frustrating , the inability to quantify a process before treating

it sounds like you are concerned about fish that loss weight and eat poorly , if you wish to quantify internal alimentary problems then feacal samples are useful, otherwise protozoan and nematodal alimentary pathogens are more common
here metronidazol and one of the levamisol/flubendazol wormers would be my first choice

guess that doesn't make it any easier

 

[A_gibbiceps]

It sure can be frustrating not being able to make a correct diagnosis. I still may try using trichrophon since I already have some around. Is there another trade name for levamisole?


Anthony

 

[fishgeek]

sorry anthony not sure on the canadian naming


this i found - Ergamisol® human oncological use

- 1. TRAMISOL 10% PREMIX cattle feed mix , may even be available at farm stores

if ia m remember ing correctly it was available in australia as a bird wormer = name avitrol? and discomed seems to be jumping into my head, though that is possibly metronidazol

best of luck andrew