Briefly on the DM issue, Ohio's laws are designed to protect an
agricultural climate. I'm no longer a resident of Ohio, despite living
there about half the time, so I doubt I could accomplish much trying to
originate any legislation to improve situations, and am not sure how
much could even be done. My vet in Florida told me that since Florida
is also considered an agricultural state (pro farmer) it is even legal
for me to perform surgery on my own animal. Legal does not equal wise.

On the dentals, it isn't difficult to learn to scrape your own ferret's
teeth, if you have someone to show you how a few times and you have a
little help. I used to do our shelter ferrets all the time, but I also
had a good volunteer that would stabilize the ferret while I scraped
and used a swab to polish a bit.

As for anesthesia, I have two 6 1/2 year olds who have pretty advanced
heart disease. Both are on huge doses of furosemide. Both had horrible
dental issues. After having my vet examine them and discussing their
situation, we opted to use a painkiller (buprenorphine) which is placed
on the gums for comfort, not do a full dental but only go in and scrape
what we could to further evaluate dental problems, and wake them up.
They were only 'out' deeply enough to relax them while the technician
worked, and when they started to come out of it, a little more ISO was
used until they were finished.

Neither ferret required extractions, both were left on amoxi to
minimize infection, and both recovered well and felt great having had
their mouths 'fixed'. Excessive tartar can cause ulcers in the cheeks,
called kissing ulcers' and be very painful. This was not perfect, but
a compromise that was good for both ferrets. It's also important to
realize dental disease is hard on the heart.

Just my take on the subjects,

Julie

Julie Fossa 
West Central Ohio Ferret Shelter
http://www.wcofs.org
International Ferret Congress
http://ferretcongress.org/

[Posted in FML 5532]