Dear Rebecca:
 
>Well, Socks had his 2nd ultrasound today and the news isn't good.  His
>adrenal tumor has enlarged, lymph nodes are enlarged and so is his
>prostate gland.
 
You didn't mention which lymph nodes are enlarged.  Abdlominal lymph nodes
are commonly enlarged in older ferrets and are not generally an indication
of lymphoma.  If we are talking about other nodes - the ones that you can
readily feel, then we need to think more about the possibility of lymphoma.
 
At this point, I would hold off on any adrenal treatment (as long as there
is no problem urinating) until the lymph nodes have been investigated.  If
the nodes do turn out to be lymphoma, the average life span of affected
ferrets really doesn't justify pursuing definitive treatment for the
adrenal glands.
 
>They're hesitant to put him on prednisone because of the odd infection he
>had back in October, because they don't want to harm his immune system.
>To look at him you'd never know Socks had anything going on inside of him.
 
I'm not sure why we would want to start prednisone here quite yet until we
know what is going on with the lymph nodes.  It is not really a treatment
for adrenal glands, and if we have to use it to treat a possible lymphoma,
there we ar not going to worry about previous illness or adrenal disease.
 
>I realize that the enlarged lymph nodes could be nothing, caused by
>anything, and I also know it could be the beginning of lymphosarcoma.
 
>Dr. Williams, have you seen this happen many times with ferrets with
>adrenal, that the nodes enlarge and aren't cancerous?
 
Adrenal disease generally has nothing to do with lymph nodes, so the two
process are probably not related at all.
 
With kindest regards,
Bruce Williams, dVM
[Posted in FML issue 3301]