Amy, please, notice also that the animals from the pet store origin would
very likely have had far more exposure to infectious agents which could
easily be precursors to a much later health problem (also true of shelter
animals of all types -- they just are in situations which expose them to
more illnesses, including human- or other pet-borne ones), they might have
been sedated at a young age for transit, they had what was probably a much
more stressful environment (all those new faces, pokey fingers, barking
dogs, etc.) which could alone or in combination with something like a neuter
be associated with hormonal perturbation, and so on.  That said, your
results are very intriguing and could help direct folks to what sorts of
thing should be investigated formally; maybe you will be involved then,
too(?).  I find I keep going back to Mike Dutton saying that in his practise
he thinks he's run across as many as four types of adrenal disease.  It may
be that these have to be better differentiated before more can be known
since the differences might muddy studies but the tools are not yet in place
to do that (though separation might not be needed).
 
Sukie
[Posted in FML issue 1965]