Message Number: YG13391 | New FHL Archives Search

From: SanQuatre@aol.com
Date: 2002-05-30 20:54:00 UTC
Subject: seizures cause unknown, help needed!

I believe that Mystik's blood sugar is under control now, but that
isn't exactly a concern as of now. After all that she's gone
through, the surgery I don't think was what she needed, at least not
as of now.

When I went to see Mystik today, the whole while I was holding her,
I believe she was having a seizing episode. I don't know if she
realized I was there or not. She was "star gazing" as the vet put
it, with her head straight up and back. The vet and the nurse took
her back then and gave her medicine, now I don't remember what kind,
and she stopped. They said she was sleeping then and that they could
bring her back, but I said I really didn't want to wake her if she
was resting. Although now I regret not holding her again.

The vet talked with us for quite awhile and basically said she
wasn't doing as well as he hoped, but he wasn't going to give up on
her. He was hoping that she wouldn't have any more seizures because
since we brought her in on Sunday she hadn't had any until today
(Thursday). He said that the star gazing was a sign of neurological
problems and there could be several factors as to why she's doing
it.

I told him about how a couple of weeks ago she would walk around and
bump into things and then put her head into the corner or beneath
something or in a shoe. In her cage she would also be disoriented
and walk around in excrement and then usually put her head in the
corner of her litter box. I thought that these things were due to
low blood sugar so I was giving her more prednisone. I know that
when she did have episodes of low blood sugar she would wander
around rooms aimlessly and try and stick her head into things.

The vet told me that often animals with neurological problems put
pressure to their head like that. I don't know why and I don't
remember if he said that animals specifically with brain tumors do
that or not. He also said that the prednisone, if she has a brain
tumor, could have helped reduce the effects of the tumor and now it
just isn't working for her anymore.

Her signs are very confusing. She stopped the seizing the day we
brought her into the vet on Sunday and now today she started again
for unknown reasons. I guess the vet thought that taking care of the
tumors on her pancreas and adrenal gland would stop the seizures as
it would stop the erratic blood sugar. But we have never found the
reason for her seizures.

The vet said Mystik always screamed signs of hypoglycemia from
insulinoma when she had the seizures, but then of course we came to
find that she had gotten high blood sugar rather than low. She did
have insulinoma, yes, because tumors were removed from her pancreas.
Also vet blood tests showed that she had low blood sugar episodes.

Here is basically Mystik's time line of events:
*At 5 Mystik developed cataracts. She was taken to the vet for
acting sluggish and lethargic and he said it was most likely due to
her not seeing well.
*A few months afterwards Mystik is taken to the emergency vet
because she is not responsive, just laying down. The emergency vet
did blood tests and found she has low blood sugar and so they give
her a shot of glucose and she is just fine. We took her to the
regular vet and he said she most probably had insulinoma. We asked
if we should do surgery and he said that medication would prolong
her life just about as long as surgery. So we put her on prednisone
in pill form at first, then switched to the liquid because it is
easier to give. She was nearly always given 0.5 cc twice a day.
*Mystik was on prednisone for roughly a year and did just fine. It
was just two weeks ago when she began to show signs of
disorientation in her cage. Mystik would stumble and be unbalanced.
She had trouble eating her food so I would have to hold her while
she ate. A few times she fell down in her cage and often when she
got to the bottom floor she was unable to get back up. When out of
her cage she would put her head in corners and in things like shoes
and just lay there for a time. She did want to walk around, though,
and besides the disorientation she seemed healthy. She would often
bump into things, though, without much caution. She didn't used to
do that.
*We took her to the vet a few days after she began to act different
when giving her small increases of prednisone didn't work for her.
The vet ran a blood test which showed her blood sugar to be a bit
low, her liver, heart, and kidneys were in good shape, though. He
said for a six year old ferret she was in good shape. He gave her
Ligui-Tinic 4x concentrated nutritional drops because they were high
in B vitamins and he said that would help her neurological. I gave
her 0.4 cc of this daily. I honestly do not know if it helped her
any. She never really seemed to improve with the vitamins. The vet
also said something about it being possible for her to have an ear
infection, even though it wasn't picked up in the blood test.
*Mystik did not seem to eat on her own after the last vet visit so I
began feeding her by hand. She was always willing to eat and I would
give her as much as she would take.
*For about two weeks after she last went to the vet she was acting
the same as before, but then began to have seizures one week ago
(Thursday). At first they were little tremors in her face and I did
not realize what they were at first. When her seizures progressed
her body would tense up, but be pretty much still. Only her back
legs would shake some. Her eyes would get wide, her mouth would chew
rapidly and her lips would twitch. Mystik had not been acting well
that day. I could not get her to walk around and she did not seem
very interested in eating. She really should have gone to the vet
that day, but I was stupid and went out of the house for most of the
time. We called the vet that night and he said to give her karo
syrup and that we could give her up to 1 cc of prednisone that
night, because we assumed she was having hypoglycemic seizures.
*Through that night she kept seizing around every 15 minutes. I kept
feeding her nutrical, ensure plus, and water. She walked around
some, but mostly she just slept between the seizing.
*On Friday she spent the day at our regular vet. Now I really do not
know if they did a blood test on her then. I think it may have been
possible they were unable to get enough blood or something. To my
knowledge I don't think they did one, but I may have missed the vet
talking about it. While Mystik was at the vet she threw up (she
never did this at home at all, though and hasn't since), so the vet
suspected she had a blockage that was keeping her from digesting
food properly. He said we should bring her back on Tuesday and get
her reassessed. If she was seeming well enough then he said surgery
should be done to see if she had a blockage and pancreas tumors and
such could be removed. At this point he still thought she was
hypoglycemic I believe. He said to giver her sugar water and to feed
her every hour, basically.
*Friday night Mystik seemed to show a bit of improvement even though
she still seized. She got to walking around some and acting at least
somewhat normal. We gave her chicken baby food every hour and
Timmy's Tonic (herbal treatment for ferrets). She was getting the 1
cc of prednisone and also 0.5 cc of Phenobarbital to try and help
with the seizures. I don't think the phenobarb helped at all,
though.
*By Saturday afternoon she was having more seizures. Sometimes she
would seize every five minutes to every 15. I was getting more
scared for her by this time. She didn't want to walk around anymore,
although she would get up to go to the bathroom. When she seized her
saliva had traces of blood, which we still assume came from a cut in
her mouth.
*Around 10 that night we took her to the emergency vet to see what
they could do about the seizures. They said that all they could do
really would be to hook her up to an IV and keep her there to
monitor her and do a blood test. They didn't know if they could stop
the seizures or not. We were hoping we could get proglycem there or
if they could tell us were to get some because we were assuming she
was having hypoglycemic seizures still. All they did there was giver
her a glucose shot and we took her back home. Throughout the night
she kept seizing around every 15 minutes or so and didn't improve
any. She didn't get up to go to the bathroom anymore and just went
where she was laying.
*On Sunday she was still the same. We were trying to find a place to
get her proglycem because we didn't know what else to do for her. We
called the [university] veterinary hospital and they basically told
us she needed to be in a clinical setting and tests needed to be
done even though they could get us the proglycem if that was needed.
So we took her there on Sunday afternoon.
*A few hours later it was found that she had high blood sugar rather
than low, like we had been under the impression of, and she was
given some insulin. She was hooked up to a jugular IV so fluids and
medicine could be given to her. After we took her to the hospital
she didn't have any more seizures and slept mostly although she
would walk around sometimes and would eat.
*On Monday she was a bit more active then Sunday, but still she
mostly slept. She didn't have any more seizures. She would eat and
at one point she managed to pull out her IV. Her blood sugar had
dropped into normal range. She still wasn't acting normal, though,
mostly just slept.
*Tuesday the regular vet looked at her. She had an ultrasound done
on her stomach, nothing serious was found. More blood work was done,
although specifically I am not sure what. The vet said our best
option was to go with surgery to see what was going on with her. We
were assuming that she had adrenal problems as well as insulinoma
and that was causing her to have erratic blood sugar. Mystik was
acting a bit more responsive, but still slept most of the time.
*Wednesday Mystik was acting pretty much the same and in the
afternoon she had surgery. The vet said she did all right and so far
she has recovered fine, although more slowly than the vet would
like. During the surgery nodules/tumors were removed from her
pancreas as well as part of it, her left adrenal was removed as it
was enlarged and discolored. Also her lymphnodes were enlarged so
the vet took some to do a biopsy. I do not remember if he did
anything with the liver or spleen or not. So far we do not have the
test results from those things. She was put on antibiotics as well
as pain medication and put in an oxygen room.
*Today I was told Mystik had three seizure episodes, including when
I was holding her. She did not want to eat and she mostly slept. She
is still on the antibiotics, but off of the pain medication. I
believe they have been giving her small amounts of prednisone and
she still has the IV in her neck to give her fluids. They gave her
some medicine to stop her seizure/star gazing. I don't know if right
now they're giving her anything else. He said her seizures could be
caused from several things from infection to virus to brain
inflammation to tumor.

The vet said that they want to do another blood test if they can get
enough to do it and he wants to consult with some other vets who
know a lot about ferrets. He also said if she doesn't want to eat
still tomorrow that he will have to consider giving her intravenous
feeding to help her along. He said he wanted to try and do tests to
see if she has some kind of neurological infection that could be
causing the seizures. He said even though she is on antibiotics it
was possible they could not affect anything going on in the brain as
the blood around there protected the brain or something like that. I
don't know what else. I think that's all basically. Her blood sugar
is doing okay now. The vet is disappointed with her progress, but he
says he isn't giving up on her, that there is hope. I am sorry I can
not give moer detailed infromation about her blood work and
everything like that.

We were hoping that the surgery would help her and that she wouldn't
have any more seizures, but now we still don't know what's wrong
with her. If ANYONE can give me ANY information on ferrets having
seizures that is not related to hypoglycemia please send it to me.
If there is any medication or anything we can do for Mystik to be
neurologically sound again we will most surely try it. Thank you to
everyone.

-Kim