From:
I K
Date: 2008-01-21 16:46:56 UTC
Subject: RE: [ferrethealth] Re: one leg lameness in rear, no break on xray..what's wrong?
To: <ferrethealth@yahoogroups.com>
I am sorry I neglected to give you more info my little girl.
The night before, her and I were playing as if nothing was wrong. I actually stayed up with her very late and found her to be absolutely normal in every possible way.
The next morning when I went to feed them, she did not get up for her feeding and I just assumed she was very tired and being lazy from the night before, so I let her rest.
After a couple of hours, I went down again and she still had not moved from where she was sleeping and had not eaten, so I picked her up and held her for a bit to get her up and alert. I fed her by hand, as I make a home made soup style food, and then put her down and within a minute, knew something was wrong. She just lay on the floor and would not move for the first few minutes. When she did start to try and move, she dragged her hind legs behind her to get to where she needed to go, which was to the bathroom. She got herself back up on all fours to go to the bathroom and tried to walk on all fours, but quickly dropped and started dragging her hind legs again.
She did have feelings in the leg and she did on rare occassion try to use them, but it was a huge struggle and she always resorted back to dragging herself around.
The first vet took and x-ray and said everything was normal, but figured she had a back problem.
The second vet did not know what was wrong, but was smart enough to send me to the University, where they have highly trained professionals to work with.
They ran blood work, which came back normal. They another xray, which showed nothing, and finally they did the ultrasound and noticed that the lymphnode in her abdomen area was enlarged. They then put a needle into that lymphnoid and pulled fluid so they could get a better idea if that was the problem and sure enough, the fluid came back showing it was abnormal.
She has been on chemo therapy and although she started off not responding well to it at all, the found the lymphoma went from a size 4.0 to a .2 just after 3 chemo treatments.
Her white blood cell count dropped far too low and so we have had to stop for now. I think we both realized that the chemo they were giving was a little too much for her body to take because they were blown away at how much the size changed just over 3 chemo treatments.
Anyway, I hope this will help you a little more.
I do not know much about torn legaments or anything, so would not even be able to suggest it could be that.
I cannot remember if you mentioned she had an ultra sound done or not, but that might be the route you have to take if not done so already. An xray seems to show so little, unfortunately, where the ultra sound is so detailed and can say so much more about what is going on inside.
Please let me know what the end result is. I am very curious and we all learn from each others experiences.
I hope my information has helped, but I need to mention one thing so you do not worry too much yet. That same vet that diagonosed her with lymphoma also stated that sometimes ferrets can catch a viral infection and drag their legs for that as well.
It is basically their way of telling you something is not right inside. The hard part is, determining what the wrong part is.
Again, please let me know. I would really be interested in knowing what it could possibly be. Thank you,
IRENE
To: ferrethealth@yahoogroups.comFrom: scott1ct@yahoo.comDate: Mon, 21 Jan 2008 05:25:41 +0000Subject: [ferrethealth] Re: one leg lameness in rear, no break on xray..what's wrong?
Irene, My ferret has been to three vets in one week and the problem seems tobe localized to the leg. You offered no corresponding info to whatconditions or symptoms your ferret was in including age or exactsymptoms of your little girl. My situation was immediate lameness inone leg, no other problems and he has been thoroughly examined forenlarged organs which is indicative of lymphoma or paralysis as Imentioned his reluctance to move the affected limb is not lack offeeling as he responds to stimuli in it. Please give me more directinfo from your experience so I can see if this corresponds to minerather than push to an extreme negative diagnosis.
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