Hi Everyone,

About three weeks ago I posted about Oreo (LuvU) a ferret who we was
surrendered with a horrific leg injury and after careful consideration
had his rear leg amputated. I wanted to give an update as we have had
some unexpected challenges with him.

Ten days after surgery he had all of his stitches out, there were quite
a few, (I stopped counting after 18 and there were plenty more). The
stitches went all the way up and across his body due to his leg being
removed all the way up to the hip, discarding alot of non-viable tissue
and skin as well as him receiving some reconstruction of the skin from
his abdomen to tuck and use only healthy skin. He completed his regime
of 0.01 Baytril which was at 100mg/ml twice a day to keep the likihood
of infection at bay. He had one good day of him playing and pawing at
me in a ferret like manner and we were quite hopeful.

Over the next two weeks, he would eat bowls of our dook soup but didn't
have any energy or interest in poking around the room. Even though we
gradually allowed him more out of the cage time he would only eat his
soup and then go hide and sleep in one of the many sleepy areas we have
for our older and hospice ferrets. I began to worry when he stopped
giving kisses and started to have a far away look.

We had addressed his immediate medical concerns and I wondered if we
were missing something. We did lose two of our hospice ferrets recently
who had befriended Oreo (LuvU). Could he be depressed, missing Jasper
and Milo? I also wondered what a realistic recovery from such a major
surgery should be. Rather than guess I brought him to our most
experienced vet office who handles our "interesting cases" for a
thorough exam. He weighs 2 pounds, (he has gained a little over a
quarter of a pound which is good considering the weight loss of his
leg). His eyes, ears, teeth, heart, lungs all ok. We guess his age is
around four so yep, we did a blood glucose. I almost fell over when it
came back as 33 (yikes!) No matter why he was "pokey"!! So he has been
put on prednisone 0.75 1mg/ml twice a day with all the soup he can eat
for the past four days.

I waited to see how long it would take for him to perk up and as a
couple of days went by I hoped for improvement. This morning I held him
while he ate all his soup with the medicine in it and whispered to him
how very many people wanted him to get well as there are so many that
come to us too late to help. He squirmed to get down, which for any
other ferret is annoying but I was happy at his squirming and took this
to be an improvement. Kind of like when a ferret is so sick they don't
flinch at the nasty medicine, but then they start fighting with you and
you know they are getting better. He hopped into the fuzzy tube and
poked his head out. This in itself is not significant for a ferret
but for this ferret it's a challenge. In order to do this he has to
pull himself upright and balance on his remaining hind leg in a round
movable tube. I ruffled his head and the little bugger bit me! He
tucked his head back down and did it again! Now I was laughing, stuck
my hand inside the tube and he rolled on his back grabbed my hand and
mouthed and kicked at me playing, and I heard the sound that was music
to my ears......a single DOOK.

I really think he may pull through, I see the pin light at the end of
a very long recovery tunnel for him and we will go for it, despite the
finances, despite the love and care that he didn't get before he came
to us. Oreo and his naked sister Serafina (fiesty girl) are with us as
well has his brother Thor who is younger and quite playful.

Now if I can get him to hold still, I'll get some more pictures of him
to share with you all. We will continue to put up our dry dook soup
items on eBay to continue to chip away at his medical bill as well as
any future care he will need. Check out the items as well as some new
Valentine's Day items at:
http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZsouthshoreferretcare

Sincerely,
Diane Wall
South Shore Ferret Care 

[Posted in FML 5868]