From:
"carol"
Date: 2004-05-04 05:35:35 UTC
Subject: Left adrenal removed, but no adrenal tumour found.
To: <ferrethealth@smartgroups.com>
Message-ID: <28591825.1083650205530.JavaMail.nobody@chromium.smartgroups.com>
Hello everyone,
I wonder if anyone can shed any light on this, as we have no diagnosis as to what
caused this illness.
I have a jill (about 5 years of age). No previous illnesses. She started to sleep more
around Aug/Sep last year, and for several months, I thought it was perhaps her age,
as she was eating, drinking and everything else, as normal. By November, she was
only coming out of her cage for around 15 minutes per day, then would put herself
back to bed to sleep. I then noticed she had started to swell a little around her
stomach and was feeling quite thin across her shoulders, She also had some tail hair
loss about 1/3 up from the tip - had never lost tail hair before this time.
I took her to the vets and she gave her a physical examination. She said that she
thought her spleen was enlarged and suggested blood tests.
The results showed a higher than normal amount of white blood cells. Ellie (ferret)
was put on a course of antibiotics (Baytril) for a week, and Prednisolone for 3 weeks.
Her spleen went back to normal size and her general activity level increased.
However, within 3 weeks of finishing the medication her spleen had started to
enlarge again. My vet decided to do a laparotomy, which took place in February this
year.
Her spleen was removed, as it had several nodules on it, as well as being enlarged.
She also removed Ellie's left adrenal gland, as this looked abnormal (sorry, didn't
ask my vet in what way the adrenal looked 'abnormal').
Both samples were sent to the lab for analysis, but when the report came back, they
had found no evidence of any tumours in either the spleen, or the adrenal. The only
thing they found in both samples was 'a lot of reactive tissue' - to what, we have no
idea.
Ellie is certainly more active and happy since her surgery, but has a small amount of
weakness in her back legs, and tail hair still isn't back. However, I still don't feel
she's as active as she should be for her age, and I'm really at a loss as to where to
go with this, if she starts to decline again.
Has anyone any ideas what might have caused this. Is it likely that she's had a
chronic infection (thinking back to the blood results), and would that have affected
her adrenal gland in that way?
Any ideas are much appreciated
Carol