From:
"Ulrike"
Date: 2004-09-06 16:03:11 UTC
Subject: Hobo's (horrible) surgery (was not able to urinate)
To: "Ferrethealth" <ferrethealth@smartgroups.com>
Message-Id: <413C8A3F.000015.02712@FERRETLOVE1>
I wrote about my ferret Hobo and sent in his blood values yesterday and said
he wasn't able to urinate and had hind end weakness. This morning I tried
to express his bladder as he looked so uncomfortable and while it "bulged"
around his penis, nothing came out.
Anyway, he was booked in for today and we did an exploratory. It was the
most horrendous operation I have witnessed. First when they intubated him
and did an ultrasound, he wasn't getting enough gas and woke up a little,
enough to struggle. :-( Then during surgery he stopped breathing a few
times. Vet found a lot of suspicious growths on his pancreas, looked like
lymph nodes, not insulinomas. The left adrenal gland looked bad so was
removed. It looked cystic and part of it was so close to the vena cava that
vet could not remove all of it... She did cut a blood vessel and I saw a
lot of blood and I thought "great, here we go, she got the vena cave, that's
it then..." but it turned out she cut the blood supply of the tumour.
Bleeding was stopped. After that was done, we emptied the bladder and got
30ml out of it. That's a lot, right? Vet tried to feel around the bladder
and prostate but could not feel anything unusual but said she doesn't really
know how it should feel like in a ferret.
So now I'm home and will hopefully fetch Hobo at 6 pm. Vet doesn't know if
she wants Hobo to go home at all but since there is nobody at the vets at
night, he may as well come back home.
I just feel so bad at the moment. Hobo was very ill before and I feel like
we've just made it worse because now he has pain from surgery. (He is on
painkillers but still...) What if he still can't pee? If it is prostate
related and we removed enough adrenal gland, how soon will he be able to
pee? Should we give some prostate medication "just in case"?
Ulrike
West Wales Ferret Welfare
E-mail: ulrike@ferretlove.co.uk
http://www.ferretlove.co.uk
Last update 10/08/04