‘Get them healthy’: Brevard Zoo testing new therapy to heal turtles covered in tumors

Sick sea turtles swimming ashore in Florida

Sea turtles all over the Space Coast in Central Florida are sick, and many of them are covered in tumors which is why the Brevard Zoo is testing a new therapy to help with healing.

MELBOURNE, Fla. - Sea turtles all over the Space Coast are sick, and many of them are covered in tumors, which is why the Brevard Zoo is testing a new therapy to help with healing.

FOX 35 News met Crouton at the Sea Turtle Healing Center housed at the Brevard Zoo. He’s a green sea turtle who is very, very sick. He has massive tumors on him, which are affecting his ability to swim and hurting his health.

"That disease is so debilitating, and I couldn’t imagine being a turtle with a big ball on my eye," said Joel Cohen, who comes into contact with many of these sick turtles working with the Sea Turtle Preservation Society.

Cohen says about 20 to 25% of the turtles they rescue in Brevard County are covered in tumors and end up at the Brevard Zoo.

"They’re not able to survive well with the disease on their own," said Dr. Trevor Zachariah, the Director of Veterinary Programs at the Brevard Zoo.

Zachariah says fibropapillomatosis is common in green sea turtles living in the Indian River Lagoon. Vets usually remove them, but sometimes the tumors come back.

To try to keep turtles tumor-free, veterinarians are trying something new.

"Instead of just surgery to remove the tumors, we’re doing chemotherapy, but the twist is to apply a very minute electrical charge to the tumors at the same time as you give the chemotherapy drug," the doctor said.

Zachariah says the electrical charge could take healing to a whole new level.

"The charge on the tumors allows the drug to penetrate into the tumor cells than just on its own," he said.

So far, the therapy’s been used on about 12 sea turtles staying at the Brevard Zoo, and early results are promising.

"With the really large tumors, they will actually shrink, so the surgery to remove the tumor, so the surgery ends up being a lot less extensive," Zachariah said.

Some tumors have even fallen off on their own. Following guidelines by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC), the zoo is doing this study to nurse sick turtles back to health and find better ways to cure them because the goal is to "get them healthy and get them back into the wild."

There is no set timeline for when this study will end. The zoo says they are one of many organizations testing to see how this new therapy will work and if it will be a proven tool to heal turtles.