Med Question

[Steve Nguyen]

hello:

Anyone know what's the shelf life of Amikacin? I need to give my fish a shot but I want to make sure the med is not expires. I have an Amikacin bottle storing the fridge since last year. don't know if it's still good. it's not open yet though. my best guess, it's about 10 months old since i got it from a friend.

Steve

[koiloco]

If it's not an expensive koi, I'll give it a SHOT

[Steve Nguyen]

that's what I was thinking too so I gave it 10 ml. if it gotta go, it gotta go.

I put it back to the pond after the shot and it turn side way in a few minutes. it wasn't moving and slowing grasping for air which it was doing before I gave the shot. I figure there goes another seafood meal for the neighbor's cat so I went to Costco. when I got back couple hours later, what a surprise! it was back to normal and swimming around with other fish. hope it keeps up overnight.

Steve

Quote: Originally Posted by koiloco If it's not an expensive koi, I'll give it a SHOT

[koiloco]

what does the fish have anyway that you have to give it amikacin shot?

[B.Scott]

The use by date should be on the bottle. Having said that the dates are geared to the length of time the stuff stays 100% effective. As soon as the slightest degradation occurs it is destroyed. With amikin I would feel not problem keeping it a year or so over date. I know of cases where a vet has given away over date antibiotic, not because it was ineffective but because he is no longer allowed to use them.
Bare in mind though that some medications might degrade into something toxic as they age, not just become slightly less effective.

B.Scott

[Steve Nguyen]

I have no clue. All I know was that it was fine until this morning when I saw it laying on the bottom of the pond and not moving at all. There was no visual infection on the body such as ulcer or cut; However, there is a little small redness on the side but can only be visible at close up. It was not swimming fast at all when I try to catch it. it didn't even move far away from the spot it was laying when my net approached it.

Steve

Quote: Originally Posted by koiloco what does the fish have anyway that you have to give it amikacin shot?

[marco]

Quote: Originally Posted by Steve Nguyen hello: Anyone know what's the shelf life of Amikacin? I need to give my fish a shot but I want to make sure the med is not expires. I have an Amikacin bottle storing the fridge since last year. don't know if it's still good. it's not open yet though. my best guess, it's about 10 months old since i got it from a friend. Steve

Hi Steve, like Scott said normally you must find an expiration date on the bottle wich is valable if you didn't open the bottle.
As soon as you open the bottle, the recomandation is to not use it anymore after 26 day (for all medicine), but some of them can be used longer, some others not, depend if they are oxidated or not. About Amikacin, if you didn't open the bottle and if the date is not too long expirated (a few months) I would use it.
But maybe try to make a scrap just to know what is happening before making a blind treatment.
Marco

[Steve Nguyen]

yep, it's a blind treatment. it's one of those situation that it would take more than close up visual inspection to determine the exact root cause of the problem.

this morning, it's back to the bottom and laying on its side again. still grasping for air but probably not much longer before I feed it to the cat.

thanks for all the feedbacks, guys!

Steve

Quote: Originally Posted by marco Hi Steve, like Scott said normally you must find an expiration date on the bottle wich is valable if you didn't open the bottle. As soon as you open the bottle, the recomandation is to not use it anymore after 26 day (for all medicine), but some of them can be used longer, some others not, depend if they are oxidated or not. About Amikacin, if you didn't open the bottle and if the date is not too long expirated (a few months) I would use it. But maybe try to make a scrap just to know what is happening before making a blind treatment. Marco

[KoiCop]

Since an antibiotic needs to be the proper one re: the type of infection (gram positive or negative), and since the doseage amount needs to be proportional to the koi's weight, and since different AB's are injected by different methods (IP vs IM) I would think that worrying about a possible past due date on a random med chosen for an unknown problem would be the least of your concerns?