Hi Sue,
 
It may be that Abigail has more than one thing affecting her, but it
sounds very much like insulinoma to me and what we started out with our
Daisy.
 
The head bobbing, the wobbly, slidy legs, lethargy, and slobbering are
all signs that Daisy is heading into what I call a crash.  At that stage
you want to treat her ASAP to back the decline in blood sugar.  What we
always gave her at that point was Ferretvite (which has a fair amount of
sugar in it), then made sure after she was a little more like her normal
self that she was given food.  The Nutrical is going to help you stop
the blood sugar crashes when they happen, but you need to increase the
protein in her body immediately after - the Nutrical is only treating the
symptom, not the problem.  Daisy has had one BAD crash, just on the edge
of a coma and I used the Karo syrup instead of the Ferretvite as it was
easier to rub up on her gums and is more pure sugar so it would get into
her blood system quicker.
 
June 2002, Daisy's blood sugar was also borderline early on and our vet
started her on Prednisone.  It would help stabilize her for awhile, then
she would start to worsen, and he increased the Pred, and this happened
about 3 times.  The Pred is fairly reasonably priced - we just crushed
the pills and mixed it in Ferretone at first (cheaper than having it
mixed at the pharmacy).
 
Gradually though she did get to where the Pred wasn't enough and our vet
added diazoxide as an additional medicine (I think it is also called
Progylcem or something like that).  That has to be formulated at a
pharmacy because it isn't available in pill form, I guess it is because
it is normally an injectible.  We started that about early October 2002.
I forget which, but one of the meds is to slow the cancer (I think the
Pred) and one is to stimulate the ferret's body into being able to
utilize the glucose in their body better.
 
After a time that too seemed to loose its control on the insulinoma,
but the vet said that was all that could be done and she started to
deteriorate fairly rapidly, but hadn't gone into a coma.  We were very
definitely trying to figure out at what point the quality of her life
would get bad enough that we should put her to sleep and I was sure she
wouldn't live much longer.  That was about early-November 2002.
 
Now, I will make the suggestion that should have been made to me at the
start, and which someone on the FML told me to do.  Bob Church's Chicken
Gravy, or if you are time-pressed like me, use Gerber Baby Food Chicken
and Chicken Gravy.  Daisy, whose weight all her life was about 1lb 10 oz,
had dropped weight to about 1lb. 5oz. and was getting thinner almost
as you watched.  We started her on twice-a-day, now up to three-a-day
supplemental feeding of the chicken baby food.  It has amazed me!  It
took this poor little girl and made her feel better, more energetic and
mostly eliminated the blood sugar crashes.  She now weighs over 2 lbs.
as she is a little piggy with it.  We still keep her Totally Ferret
available at all times.  Since she started on the baby food in November,
she has only had a handful of episodes, though they do seem to be
starting to come back mildly again now.
 
The baby food chicken (or Chicken Gravy, which probably is cheaper in
the long run) really has given her some additional, good quality life.
I suggest you start that as soon as possible.  The girl who made the
suggestion to me told me her one ferret has been alive almost 4 years
after being diagnosed as a young ferret.  I don't know what our future
time left will hold, but for the time being she is doing pretty well.
She does sleep a lot more than she did before this all started, but she
seems content and comfortable.
 
We chose not to do surgery for Daisy (she has had surgery three other
times).  We have a very ferret knowledgeable vet and he felt in her case
it just wasn't the right choice.  It does help insulinoma early on from
what I understand, but has a fairly high rate of return at a later date.
That is a personal choice for you to make though.
 
I wish you good results Sue!  Keep after the vet.  The medicines will
help, but the sooner they are started the more successful long term they
will be.
 
Karla and Daisy
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[Posted in FML issue 4088]