yellow spots

Question
Greetings Chris,
I have to admit I am quite puzzled over a disease some of my fish have fallen to.  And despite my best efforts to help them, they are still ill.
Here's the basics, I have a 40G tank set up, with seven danios, four albino corys, two african rainbows, two zipper loaches, one dojo loach, one albino sucker fish, one male beta, and two half grown baby mollies.  I assure you they have proper filtration, heating, and 5G is siphoned out and replaced every three or four days.  
Now the problem.  First one of the zipper loaches got a growth on his face, not on any vital part of his face.  It was white where he was white, and black where he was colored black.  I figured it was a fungus.  So I treated the entire tank with a fungus eliminator by jungle.  After a treatment, I noticed a few days later that one of the rainbows now had yellow spots.  So to prevent further spread of the infection I set up a 10G hospital tank.  No one else has gotten sick.
The rainbow and loach were then treated with an antibotic, ampicillin, for I thought due to the yellow spots that the fungus had advanced to Colomnaris Disease.  I followed the directions and have now given them two full treatments.  
The two sick have been sick for four weeks now.  And although they are not worse.  They are not better either.  I don't want them to live as lepers in their hospital tank forever.  But I don't want to risk making the others sick either.
Do you have any ideas?  Is there some other medicine I should try?  Are they just slowly dying?  Or are they better and just scarred?

Please offer any advice you can.  Usually when I have a sick fish they die off within a few days.  So I'm not sure how the whole recovery process goes.  But these little guys are trying so hard, I'd feel bad if I give up on them.

Thanks, Nina

Answer
Hi Nina;

I don't think they are sick at all really. The loach probably has a mole, wart, or other benign growth. They will look weird but aren't infective. A fungus would be white and not affected by skin pigment. The rainbow probably has yellow spots as part of his mature natural coloration. When we first get these fish they are young and as they grow and mature they get more coloration we never saw before. I think if they were actually sick, they would be worse and the other fish would have it too.

Your tank is pretty full too. You are doing an excellent job maintaining it. Keep making those water changes to help them all out in the long term. Adding up the fish you have in there now makes about 50 inches of fish once they grow to adult size. Your tank may be able to support that much but it must be very well maintained and the fish will have to get along very well as well as not overfeeding. Watch for squabbling between those tankmates and keep that extra tank available in case you have to separate any of them. It wouldn't hurt to add an extra filter to be sure they have a backup. I have two on my 55 gallon so if one stops I still have one going. I tend to overstock it a bit too. You just never know what might happen, so 'better safe than sorry' I always say.

Let me know if you see any more symptoms that indicate they are getting worse. I really do think they are okay though. ;-)

At Your Service;
Chris Robbins