Many years ago, when we rented, a pesticide company hired by the apartment
complex owners came by, drilled holes into the apartments (literally,
through brick outside and sheet-rock inside and then planned to come back
the next weekday to apply a named pesticide.  When this pesticide was
checked with the DEP and medical sources by several residents it turned
out to be one of the most dangerous even allowed to be used in-state by
licensed companies, and it had to be put in deep trenches a good distance
away from buildings which would then be covered over.  Applied as they had
planned to do, the DEP and medical experts assured people that it would
have killed small pets and very possibly also killed infants and toddlers,
as well as possibly have killed health-compromised people, and it would
have caused permanent damage to the others there.  They said that if it
went in to get out immediately because the place would have to be
condemned.  Luckily, as soon as the landlords heard this they fired the
pesticide company, made them fix the outside damage (though the landlord
still got stuck with the inside holes), and learned from the DEP how to
handle the pest problem safely.  If that stuff had gone in then it may only
have been through necropsies on pets like ferrets that other lives may
have been saved, including that of the newborn next-door, and an elderly
neighbor on the other side.
 
A sweet soul who recently lost two ferrets unexpectedly mentioned that she
was having to now get a CO detector.  If that turned out to be the cause
then those necropsies saved other lives, possibly her own.
 
When there was an epizooic a few years ago, necropsies with tissues sent to
Bruce Williams led to the cause being determined to be a mutant strain of
coccidea and that knowledge led to the treatment protocol and quarantines
being developed which apparently resulted in the disease being stopped in
it's tracks, and possibly wiped out completely.
 
I can well recall when it was through necropsies that the degree of hazards
caused by rubber and latex toys were partly found.
 
They have also advanced learning about pretty well any of the diseases
which now-a-days are able to be treated.
 
We've had necropsies done whenever they had a chance of improving the state
of knowledge about ferret health care, OR when they could be used to teach
non-specialists about ferrets.  Yes, that means most of our fur-family have
had them, some to teach all and improve health care and others to teach
non-specialists locally by jointly doing the procedure along with a
specialist.  Sometimes we paid, and sometimes the procedure was free.
(Heck, I eventually will have a version on myself since my cadaver is
donated to teaching for anatomy classes.  Everyone has to learn somehow.
Maybe that way I'll help teach a physician who will save a grandchild of
your's.  Who knows?)
 
In all but two cases we got the ferrets back for burial.  In the two
exceptions that problem was explained to us and we understood it beforehand
but agreed that the benefits were worth our not having a grave to help with
grieving.  One was early on before anyone had tried chemo for lympho in
ferrets (She was to be the first with chemo but advanced too fast before it
could be started.) and she'd had to be boarded at the AMC since no one knew
squat about the problem way back at that time.  They learned from Helix to
help later ferrets; she helped save lives.  They were so grateful that one
vet there back then actually cried happy tears at the chance to learn more
from her at the same time that she cried very sad ones at losing her.  In
Ruffle's case she always was just on the edge of viability; her breeder had
tried for a special coat (thick, very long and silky) and for a short face.
The breeder did get both in her but she also had serious intellectual
deficits, multiple deformities of both soft and hard tissue, and in the end
she developed something like 6 or so different and separate, simultaneous,
potentially-fatal things.  Her soft tissues wound up in one place and her
skeletal material elsewhere.  It's very hard to not have a grave, but the
gift is to other ferrets, helping to keep them alive.  That is always the
aim -- to save later ferrets, preferably not only one's own but also those
cherished by other people.
 
Now, 8 year old Meeteetse has her strange health problems.  She'll be given
quality of life as long as possible, but when she eventually goes she will
also have necropsy and pathology done in an attempt to find out what is
happening.  So many animals (not just ferrets but certainly including
ferrets) are just put-down when they have incontinence problems (mostly
fecal, sometimes urinary), or when they develop leg difficulties or spinal
growths instead of trying meds, pain meds, and wheelchairs (Waiting for
reply on the last.) as need arises.  Perhaps something will be learned from
her that might eventually lead folks in the right direction to have more
affective responses to these medical problems than we now have.  That will
help other ferrets.  The fact that veterinary care HAS advanced so very
much in fewer than two decades (especially in just the last 12 to 15 years)
shows that with a bit of help it can advance even more.  Maybe what it
learned from Meeteetse at that time might help a ferret you love in future
years, maybe it might help one we love.  There's no way to know except to
try -- "for the ferrets", as Mike writes.
 
I guess it boils down to this: necropsies save later lives; they are a
sacrifice made to give hope for the future.
 
It doesn't matter whose future as long as it helps.
 
I am sorry that someone felt flamed in relation to necropsies in the past;
more likely I suspect the people responding just were worried sick (perhaps
for the human as well as for the ferrets) and simply didn't express that
well.  Happens.  It's also easier to misread or to read things into letters
when under stress, as when grieving.  Don't think I've seen flames on-list
recently; disagreements among friends who still also send jokes and
touching stories back and forth privately, yes, but not flames.  Nothing
wrong with disagreeing; variety helps the world.
[Posted in FML issue 3186]