http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20060121/fob4.asp
 
There have been times when people here have asked about possible health
problems in ferrets in relation to plastics.  Largely, it has been
hypothetical -- opinions and guessing which really don't help much
since they have nothing solid to go on.
 
There is now some non-ferret work on one plastic compound and diabetes:
http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20060121/fob4.asp
 
Title:
>Diabetes from a Plastic?  Estrogen mimic provokes insulin resistance
 
Some parts may (or may not -- there are still too many pieces missing
for ferrets) be of interest, for example:
 
>Nadal and his colleagues injected adult male mice with ... either
>bisphenol-A or an equal amount of the natural female sex hormone
>estradiol.  Animals received as many as eight shots over 4 days.
 
As you see, the dosing was high.
 
>Within 30 minutes of an injection, animals receiving either the sex
>hormone or bisphenol-A had abnormally low concentrations of glucose
>in their blood
...
>January Environmental Health Perspectives. The chemicals acted on
>recently discovered estrogen receptors on pancreatic cells' surfaces
>to boost the cells' secretion of insulin...
 
>Repeated exposure to either bisphenol-A or the natural estrogen
>over several days produced insulin resistance
...
>Estrogen receptors in the pancreatic-cell nucleus appear to
>contribute to this gradual effect.
 
The compound has also been under study as a possible contributor to
childhood obesity, and to gestational diabetes.
 
For more information, please, see the Science News article by Ben
Harder which is quoted, or seek out a copy of the "Environmental
Health Perspectives" articles through your loaning library, or both.
 
It seems that the newly discovered estradiol receptors of the pancreas
could perhaps be intriguing for study in relation to simultaneous cases
of pancreatic woes and adrenal ones (or pancreatic ones following adrenal
ones), and perhaps it would be especially interesting to see if insulin
resistance is more commonly seen if there is also an adrenal growth due
to the high output of estrogens from diseased ferret adrenals.  If so,
then perhaps knowing if there was/is also an adrenal growth may signal
a reason for a vet to watch a surgical patient especially carefully
for a switch over to diabetes, or perhaps it may impact the degree of
post-surgical diabetes.  There are multiple possible speculations, of
course, but the latter seems to be the one for which there may be more
pieces in place at this point in time, so that possible research may be
stronger and easier to fund for a start, if my brain is working right.
Of course, this is merely speculation.
[Posted in FML issue 5130]