From:
juliegambone@hotmail.com
Date: 2003-05-02 18:34:40 UTC
Subject: early neuter, adrenal? and young ferret issues...
To: ferrethealth@smartgroups.com
Message-ID: <3974641.1051922738251.JavaMail.nobody@magnesium>
Hi, I'm new to this group and found you as I was looking for information on a
correlation between early neuters and adrenal. I have three ferrets, a 10 month
old girl, a 9 month old boy, and a 6 month old boy. The youngest is the one
that we suspect to have adrenal (he is a dark-eyed white and is losing hair
symmetrically on his back, near his hind quarters to the point that you can see
his pink skin clearly through it). Our vet thinks it is adrenal and told us to keep
an eye on it and if it gets worse to bring him back - is this the best idea or
should we get blood tests or find some definitive proof sooner than later? He
is a licensed exotic vet and sees many ferrets.
Also, we lost our first little girl, Gabby, on April 8th to lymphosarcoma - she
was just two weeks away from her first birthday.
[She had been to our first vet 6 months prior for drastic weight loss and
lethargy, he told us it was probably just a flu and gave us antibiotics. She
leveled out and gained some energy back (she was always a lazy one) so we
didn't feel there was reason for concern. Then, she went rapidly downhill and
we took her to an emergency vet and then to our current vet the following day.
He examined her and decided on exploratory surgery, which she did not make
it through. The problem was only diagnosed afterwards through biopsies of a
lesion found on her pancreas and of her sickly liver.]
After losing Gabby so young and so suddenly and then finding out two weeks
later that our youngest, Snowball, likely has adrenal, I did some research and
found that there is much dispute over early spay/neuter practices. So for those
of you that have more experience with ferrets than I, do you think that [early
neutered] ferrets are more prone to health issues or other problems? I have
looked into a private breeder for our next kit, but I want to know if there is
enough of a difference to justify the expense. Its just so hard to watch ones
that are so young suffer from such serious issues, and with two
out of four getting sick at less than a year...
Thanks,
Julie
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