Wow,
This has been a nightmare two days for me! On Monday, my little 4.5 year
old MF female, Pixie (my only ferret) was completely listless and barely
wanted to walk around at all. She hadn't eaten overnight, and wasn't
pooping, so we thought blockage, and tried mineral oil (which we had on
hand) to try and clear it (did this around 4pm). At 6pm when we got home,
she had done a small poopy, but not eaten anything, and was even more
listless, so she went off to the emergency vet.
They did bloodwork and x-rays. The vet at the time said the bloodwork was
normal (I don't have the results with me), and her temp was 103. She has
an enlarged spleen, and what looks like a potential blockage on the x-ray
(the spleen can easily be felt). The vet gave her a shot of antibiotics
(thinking that since 103 was on the high side of the normal range (which is
101-104) she might be fighting an infection), gave us NutriCal (I think I'm
remembering the name right) to give her nutritional support overnight and
let us take her home. Pixie's blood cell levels were good, her blood sugar
was good (and it was a fasting test, since she hadn't eaten), she was not
anemic or dehydrated.
This morning we took her to our more ferret-knowledgeable vet, who found
that her lymph glands were all swollen. He said "maybe lymphoma" and did an
aspirates to check. He didn't find cancer cells. So now he thinks severe
systemic infection. They are checking the blood to try to determine if
it's kidney or liver, or something else they can determine from the blood.
Any thoughts? I will be asking whether she might have a blockage that
caused an ulcer, which caused the infection (especially since her temp
wasn't that high last night). They're letting us take her home tonight,
so we'll be seeing the doc when we pick her up.
I'll be online tonight until 5pm eastern (Tuesday) and then again tomorrow
morning, so feel free to respond directly.
Thanks for any help you can give.
Debbie & Jim
Pixie (The one in charge, who has no energy right now)
[Posted in FML issue 2363]
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