Message Number: YG12691 | New FHL Archives Search
From: penniep2001
Date: 2002-04-22 21:09:00 UTC
Subject: IBD Treatments

I have a four year old 2.6 lb male nutered ferret that until two
months ago exhibited no health problems at all. He began throwing up
his food and was unable to keep anything down. He quit eating dry
kibble but would eat my duck soup mix of ground up soaked kibble plus
Hill's AD plus Gerber' chicken baby food. Then he no longer would
eat that either but just gag when any food was offered. We went
through the antibiotics routine with flagil and amoxi and I tried
giving carafate also but he was just fighting all the medications. I
was forcing him to eat but about half the time he would throw it
up. We tried riglan syrup and carafate but he would promptly throw
it up. Blood work came back normal.

We did exploratory and pathology came back as ensophilic and
lymphocitic enteritis. He was put on Prednison. The compound I got
was 5mg/ml and we started him on .1 cc per day for two weeks then
decreased to .1cc every other day and he did wonderfully. His
appetite came back he was playing and seemed back to normal. We
stopped the Pred and within a month it came back with all the same
symptoms. A week ago he was put back on the pred at the same dosage
and we slowly gave about 6 cc's every hour to hour and a half while
simultaneously giving fluids and riglan by shot. He seemed to improve
all week but last Saturday he quit eating and began gaging again.

I checked the files and found the Imuron information from Dr.
Burgess's article but I have some questions. The article seems to
suggest that Imuron should be used in place of prednison. However
one of the vets at the practice I use(not my regular vet) contacted
a "exotic"expert who told her to use the .3mg/kg of Imuron but to
give it every other day and alternate with prednisone. In addition
she thinks maybe we should use an antibiotic since the Imuron is an
imuno-suppressor. This little guy really hates everything but his
ferretone at this point. He takes his pred because it is componded
with ferretone.

I'm getting the imuron compounded also but don't know if we should be
adding the pred and antibiotics since they are not addressed in Dr.
Burgess's article.

I need to know what the vets on the list think of the dosage
frequency and other medications being added or any experience others
have with this therapy?