From:
"queenanne120"
Date: 2010-04-01 18:10:05 UTC
Subject: [ferrethealth] Please help identify this illness.
To: ferrethealth@yahoogroups.com
Hello,
I've joined the group in the hopes of finding answers to my ferret's illness. Rowdy is a sable rescue around 2 1/2 years old. He has been sick for over a month and no one is sure what it is.
About a month again we noticed Rowdy was just a tad less playful. This quickly became moderate lethargy with a bit of a wobble in his step. We took him to the emergency vet. They did x-rays, glucose test, and blood work. Blood sugar and x-ray were both normal. The blood work showed elevated levels of globulin (I'm writing this from memory so I may get some the the technical stuff wrong). The vet said it was likely lymphoma.
About 6 months before this Rowdy was vomiting and had surgery for a blockage. It turned out the lymph node near the stomach was swollen and partially blocking digestion. The tissue was biopsied and negative for lymphoma. It was also negative for Corona virus, TB, and a few other things. So we were surprised when the ER vet said lymphoma.
The next day we took him to our regular vet who specializes in exotics and is considered one of the best ferret vets in the area. He looked at Rowdy and the tests and said some other indicators for lymphoma were missing and the high globulin level was likely from an ulcer, maybe brought on by stress from our recent move. He was put on antibiotics, pepcid, flagyll. He was a little stiff and squinty eyed and very lethargic so we put him on an opiate for pain. He was on these medications for a little over 21 days. During this month he slept all the time, waking up only when we gave him meds and soup made of chicken and turkey baby food and his normal kibble. His spine and tail became rigid. He would try to walk and fall over. His eyes watered a lot and he stopped cleaning himself. He got weak and dehydrated, even though we gave him watery food and pure water several times a day. His poops did not change much and he always had a good appetite. His eyes were always scrun
ched up. I never heard him grind his teeth or whimper. 2 days after he finished his meds he could barley move and was extremely rigid.
The next day we took him back to the vet. More blood work showed elevated protein levels and moderate anemia. They said there was some blood in his urine and they had to manually express his bladder. They kept him over night and they came up with several possibilities, none of which had a good prognosis. They sent out blood for a protein test that would show the presence of a virus, electrophoresis? He was started on Prednisone with the warning that this was a last ditch effort and if he didn't improve, we should start to consider euthanasia. We were heartbroken, especially because we never got a firm diagnosis.
He started the pred on Monday. Tuesday morning he was so much better. He was still weak, but his eyes were wide open and he was crawling around trying to explore. He has been on Pred for 3 days now and is still improving. The stiffness is almost gone from his spine, although he still walks like he's drunk and falls over some. He is eating damp kibble with a little bit of iron tablet mixed in. We make sure he gets lots of water. I'm not sure he is peeing alot, but he has a few times. I am so happy, but worried that this is only a temporary fix. I have scoured the internet looking for something like this, especially with the extreme stiffness. A shelter owner told me about the now rare DIM and Rowdy did have some of those symptoms, but at no point did he have a fever that we know of.
I apologize for the long post, but I wanted to get all the facts out there and see if any one had encountered this mysterious illness before.
Thank you all for any help,
Anne
------------------------------------
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ferrethealth/
<*> Your email settings:
Individual Email | Traditional
<*> To change settings online go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ferrethealth/join
(Yahoo! ID required)
<*> To change settings via email:
ferrethealth-digest@yahoogroups.com
ferrethealth-fullfeatured@yahoogroups.com
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
ferrethealth-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/