Following along on this strain...
 
Remember that not all ferret owners live in an area where it's *possible*
to get to a ferret experienced vet!  I live in North Dakota...and my choice
of vets other than the *one* in the town where I live are all over an
hour's drive away.
 
In cases such as mine it's important to educate yourself and find a vet
that you can in turn educate...and it is possible.  I'm disabled and simply
can't drive three hours one way on a regular basis to someone who might or
might not be good for my ferrets.  The local guy isn't familiar with them,
and will give them their shots, do general check-up, but otherwise isn't
comfortable treating them.  I appreciate his honesty...and the man doesn't
have time to learn a new animal.  He is one vet for the entire area, both
small and large animal...how the man has time for a life, I don't know.
 
Thankfully I found the best of all possible vets in a town that had a
graduating class of 8 last year, and only one paved road.  She's been in
practice 25 years this year...typical country vet.  Hadn't seen ferrets
before mine.
 
Should I not take my ferrets to her...not in the least!  She loves to
learn, loves new challenges.  Loves to have her clients involved in what
she's doing, loves to have them bring information in for her.  I was told
by some people that I shouldn't let her see my ferrets who were sick
because she didn't know about them.  She is, by far, the best vet that I
have ever taken any of my animals to.
 
She was willing to do the more complicated surgury for Rocky for his
insulinoma and adrenal.  Spent time talking to Dr. Weiss about it, in fact
wouldn't do anything less after she saw the article.  She called after the
surgury and was honest with me that she hadn't liked the way a section of
gut had looked when she sewed him back up, but didn't want to stress him
more.  Had me come out on a Sunday to say hi to him...he hadn't been doing
well at all, probably wasn't going to make it...we got there litterally
moments after he died.  She ASKED me if I wanted to stay while she opened
him up to check what had happened.
 
Tempest had presented a lump...sudden growth...bone tumor on his skull.
She didn't give me "that look" when I told her it hadn't been there a few
weeks ago.  And she was determed to take it and the skull underneath since
it was still growing and we didn't have time to do a biopsy to see if it
was cancerous.  She did research on how to go about it...there is no
information that I've found out there about such tumors in ferrets.  I told
her to practice on Rocky after he had died.  She did, it saved Tempest's
life and she was honest about that too.  The surgury went well, despite
warnings that we would kill Temepst if we even tried it.  She couldn't have
done a better job, Tempest was back to his old self long before I was ready
for him to be, and she made several late-night emergency calls when I
wasn't sure about things.  The tumor was thankfully benign, but it very
well could not have been and she wasn't willing to write the case off as
hopeless.
 
So, while finding a good ferret vet is the best solution, the MOST
important thing is to simply find a good vet...the rest can come from
there.  Don't write off good vets because they don't know ferrets.
 
Sorry for the length, but I needed to express how I felt on the issue.  My
ferrets could be in much worse hands with the vets that had seen ferrets
around here than this woman who loves learning, trusts me, and involves me
in what's going on.  Even said she would let me watch her do surgury on
less complicated things.  This one is a definate keeper!
 
Sue
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[Posted in FML issue 2661]