Well - my poor new baby Binky has already spent the night at the Vet.
I took her in to start her distemper series, and to have a general
checkup.  She's about 9 weeks old.  Dr. Lara immediately noted a very
large mass in her abdominal area - and suspected a cystic (sp?) kidney.
She was still full of energy and eliminating properly - so an exploratory
surgery was scheduled for yesterday morning.  Sure enough - when Dr. Lara
got in there - she found a very large cystic kidney.  She went ahead and
removed it - as the other kidney appeared to be of normal shape, size
and function.  After a night of trying to chew out her sutures - I get
to pick her up this afternoon.  (I had to giggle a bit when Dr. Lara
told me that she had tried to put a _sweater_ on her to keep her from
pulling on the sutures....)  I'm just heart-broken that a) she had
the problem and b) I had to put her through that ordeal.  Her incision
is HUGE compared to her tiny body.  She's just been a gem of a ferret -
very VOCAL, but almost NO biting and has only missed her litter box a
couple of times in the 2 weeks I've had her.   Dr. Lara indicated that
the problem could have been congenital - or the result of a ureter being
snipped during her spaying.
 
My questions are these:
 
        - what other reasons could there be for this condition?
        - anything else I should look for?
        - any special considerations for caring for a ferret with
                only 1 of her kidneys?  like diet?
        - will she be OK?????
 
As a side note - it turns out that she was a MF ferret.  The lady I
got her from called them - and they agreed to either replace the
ferret (GAWD!  How could I just trade her in like a bad toaster?!) -
or pay $99 toward the cost of her surgery.  I found that interesting...
 
Dook! Dook! everybody....
 
 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
                                Cheryl Cato
 
 
                                       /|
Computing & Information Services   \'o.O'        Unix Systems Administration
Texas A&M University               =(___)=       013C Teague
College Station, TX  77843-3142       U          Phone  (409)845-6908
+----------------------------  ACK! THPTPHH!  ---------------------------+
[log in to unmask]                             [log in to unmask]
 
 
[Posted in FML issue 0805]