From:
Mary Baum
Date: 2002-03-30 20:59:00 UTC
Subject: Lymphoma and not eating
My six and one half year old ferret Arni has eating problems.
Early in the morning on March 20 I hear Arni vomiting in his
cage. I called the vet and got an appointment that morning
suspecting a blockage. The vet thought that it was probably
an ulcer and prescribed amoxi and metronidazole every twelve
hours plus pepto and to call back it he was not better soon.
There was no change so he was scheduled for x-ray and blood
test on the 25th. The x-ray showed no masses and the blood
test showed only low blood glucose (67) but normal insulin
levels and some anemia. Another vet in the practice called me
on the 28th to bring Arni in on the 29th. I did and he said
Arni has lymphoma and administered two shots of steroids to
shrink the tumors.
Arni has not vomited food only mucous or nothing at all. He
was eating well until a few days ago when I started to hand
feed him to encourage more eating. He would eat kibble out of
my hand but I noticed the he would grind his teeth sometimes
during eating. Today I could not get him to eat much softened
kibble or Eukabana high calorie food. He seems interested but
after a few licks backs off quickly as if something hurts. He
will not drink out of his water bottle so I put a water dish
in his cage. I asked the vet about the eating and lymphoma
connection and he replied that the lymphoma is lining his
digestive tract. I have read many articles on lymphoma on the
internet but have not found anything on lymphoma in the
digestive tract. Can anyone comment on this? If the cancer
is widespread I do not want to make his final days miserable
by force feeding. He had enough of a struggle getting the
medicines down.
Mary