Dear Liz:
 
>I am posting this on the FML so that others may know the answer also:
>Dr.Williams, you responded after my posting of Fang's tumor, (thank you,
>thank you), and said that a high dose of pred will help his last days.
>He is on 1/2 ml twice a day .....his glucose came in at 120 last Monday
>when they found the tumor on his liver.  ( I know it doesn't matter
>about his glucose reading now).   HOW MUCH TO GIVE A BABY THAT HAS ONLY
>WEEKS TO LIVE TO HELP HIM FEEL GOOD?  Do you think that three times a
>day dosage would be better than two? (spread them out as some people do,
>rather than two times a day?)
 
Let's leave him on this dosage for another week - we want him to be able
to heal his incision.
 
There is not a single dosage for the dying, per se.  Usually the dosage is
titrated to the clinical signs of the patient.  There is no sense giving
more than is necessary for tumor control and alleviation of clinical signs.
I'd start around 1.5-2 mg/lb once daily.  There really is no advantage to
twice or three times daily - once is usually enough.  You can give it twice
if you want, but three times a day is not necessarily better, unless he
really loves getting the stuff.
 
You've got to use your own instincts when to up the dose.  Most ferrets get
a couple of good months of tumor suppression with prednisone - the utmors
shrink and they feel better.  When they tumors overcome the prednisone,
usually the end comes very swiftly.  Unfortunately, we don't know what
point we are at, as he has already been on prednisone for a while, so we
don't know where we are in the timeline.  You'll know when it is no longer
working though.
 
With kindest regards,
Bruce Williams, DVM
[Posted in FML issue 3274]