From:
Steve Austin
Date: 2003-10-09 06:37:55 UTC
Subject: possible diabetes in a sick ferret
To: ferrethealth@smartgroups.com
Message-ID: <20031009.023804.108.31.kazpat1@juno.com>
I have a 2- 3 year old ferret Jeckyl, who was in very good health.
He had one bout of severe diarrhea and weight loss a year
ago after 7 days on Bactrim prophylaxis for coccidia that
another ferret had symptoms of and stool showed. When
Jeckyl got the diarrhea I assumed
it was coccidia too because the diarrhea was profound and
although his stool came back neg.,
he had incontinence of bowl, rectal prolapse,
and when I switched him to albon his stools were
better in 3 days. He finished 21 day course of albon, it took him
3 months to put all his weight back on.
He was fine until 9/23rd ( 11 months after the last problem).
On 9/15 I had two ferrets become ill.
first one to be ill died about a week later with black stools and
ulcers in the mouth, her tests were inconclusive and a
myriad of meds, plus bland diet and sub q's didn't work. The second
ferret was just lethargic and loose stool, her stool was pos. for
coccidia, but her BUN was 150, and she died while the vet
was giving her fluids. She was fine up until the week she died on 9/16
Since her stool showed coccidia everyone was placed on Albon.
On day 7-8 of Albon Jeckyl started to have diarrhea, he started just like
the
year before with severe diarrhea, prolapsed rectum. I asked the vet
to try Bactrim even though they are basically the same med as albon,
I just figured it worked the year before so I would try. After 3 days
he seemed better, he went to a ferret sitter on day 7 of bactrim and was
active.
He did lose a lot of weight and still his stools were loose.
At the ferret sitter he started to decline, now on day 13 of the illness.
I went to pick him up and went
to the vet B, near the ferret sitter. This vet did a stool test, blood
test
and changed his antibiotic to chloramphenical empirically on 10/7.
The stool was neg, his temp was 102.4, his blood showed a glucose
of over 500, a normal wbc, but Hematocrit of only 25. His BUN slightly
up, with close to normal creatinine ( by phone, I haven't seen the labs
yet)
I dipped a urine at home and has large glucose and blood in urine,
his stool is also pos. for occult blood. He is eating a lot, more than
a lot, which is worrying me. He is not over drinking, his pee doesn't
seem like too much. the stools are loose, and seedy, and frequent, but
not profuse and no more prolapse rectum.
He seems more active than last week, but very thin and wasted looking.
A few others are having loose stools off and on, but no one else seems
ill. I haven't been giving him sub- q because he cries and he is eating
a lot, but I am going to start now to help hydrate him.
The vet wants to do an insulin level next, he does not believe the
coccidia had anything to do with this, he is thinking it was an
incidental
finding in the one ferret's stool and should not cause this much disease.
I am hesitant to spend the money on the insulin level because I don't
think
it will help too much, it can't be just diabetes, there is too much going
on from the diarrhea, to the anemia and blood in urine and stool. I need
to treat the high glucose levels anyway, and can monitor them by nail
clip, and with dipping the urine. I just think that if we only do an
insulin level next, wait the day or two for it to come back and he
is not getting better then I am losing valuable time and maybe
wasting money? I want to be more aggressive on the diabetes treatment
and look for something that would tie all of this together.
Any other ideas, anything else to look for?
I searched the archives and read a lot of posts on diabetes which were
helpful.
Thank you,
Patty
________________________________________________________________
The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand!
Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER!
Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today!