Hello everyone!  We had a ferret medical crisis on Christmas and I was
wondering if anyone had experienced similar symptoms with their ferrets.
 
Donnie is 15 months old.  Just got his rabies/distemper shots a week ago.
We also adopted two new ferrets about ten days ago (our ferrets had spent
time with them before the actual adoption).  Christmas evening my husband
went to get the ferrets up for their evening romp and found Donnie to be
salivating heavily, staggering around and his eyes were twitching (like you
would do when you were dizzy).  I offered him Ferretvite and he ate some of
that pretty willingly.  We rushed him to a clinic, where they have dealt
with some ferrets, but they don't specialize in ferrets.  He seemed a
little better - not as wobbly - but his eyes were still twitching and he
was cold - his temp was just a little over 99.  They did a "quick" stick
for his glucose which was 91.  They kept him overnight and ran stat blood
which came back the next morning with a glucose in the mid 200s.  They also
gave him fluids via IV until he pulled the IV out (they took the blood
before giving the dextrose fluid).  Then they gave him another fluid dose
the next day.  They repeated the glucose and it was in the 60's (they did
not say if this was a fasting glucose and when his last dose of dextrose
had been).  He refused to eat solid food while he was there, but when I
brought him home today, he ate his normal food voraciously.  Once home he
staggered a little the first ten minutes after getting out of the carrier
but within a half hour the stagger was no longer there.
 
Donnie appears to be doing fine now, he wrestling with Nougat and running
everywhere.  He even played our "Where's Donnie" game (a version of
peek-a-boo).  He seems young for insulinoma and the glucose levels are up
and down.  We don't know if he got into to something with all the activity
of Christmas or whether this is more serious.  It is obvious the vet is
not confident with a diagnosis either.  They sent him home with some
antibiotics but they seem extremely confused by his symptoms.  If anyone
has any ideas - please email directly - as I am taking Donnie to the vet
who gave him his shots today.
 
Thanks...
 
Tracy & Scott and furry clan Chamberlin - Max, Misty, Don Juan, Trufe and
Nougat
[Posted in FML issue 2912]