Ophidian Cloacal Scent Gland Impaction and Surgical Excision: A Case Series in Six Different Snake Species
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract Members of the suborder Serpentes possess paired scent glands located caudal to the vent. In this retrospective case series (n = 6), four colubrids, a boid, and a viperid presented with cloacal scent gland impaction. The colubrids were greater than 17 yr old, had both glands initially or eventually affected (4/4, 100%), and most (3/4, 75%) were females. The python (Python regius)was a 10 yr old male, and the viper (Agkistrodon contortrix pictigaster) was of undetermined age and male. In the non-colubrid snakes, gland impaction was unilateral. Infection (4/6, 66.7%), mineralization (1/6, 16.7%), and neoplasia (1/6, 16.7%; fibrosarcoma) were associated with the gland impactions in the colubrids and python; a colubrid with neoplasia also had a concurrent bacterial infection and the cause of impaction was not determined in the viper (1/6, 16.7%). Medical management was attempted in 1/6 (16.7%) of the cases but was unsuccessful. Overall, complete surgical excision was realized in 9 of 10 (90%) affected glands. Postoperative infection of the surgery site was encountered in two (33.3%) snakes. The colubrids died 6 wk to 5 yr postoperatively of causes unrelated to the surgery. No complications occurred in a 5 yr follow-up of the viper, whereas an impaction recurred in association with residual glandular tissue and had to be surgically removed in the python 2 yr after surgery. Interspecific differences, age, husbandry, and concomitant pathological processes are suggested to be potential predisposing factors to developing a cloacal scent gland impaction, but additional cases supported by a thorough husbandry and medical history are needed to better delineate these possible associations.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".