bonjour!
    Victor is still very weak.  He had blood/urine tests.  It was found that
he has a lymphopenia (.6 Normal:1.5-7.0) and SGPT (ALT) -something like
hepatic enzyme?- 385 u/l but the normal is <50 u/l!!!  His glucose is low
again around 50.  The vet found trace of bilirubine in urine, no leucocytes,
a bit of blood (maybe it's come from the liquid feces who mixed with urine
when I tried to take the sample...) but NO GLUCOSE.
    This morning, his temp.  was 40,1...  He received fluid and septra.
He's back home now and accepted to eat a raisin (first food since
yesterday...), 1/4 spoon of diluted c/d, 3 spagetti, and a bit of nutrical
to swallow the pred.
    Please, I would like to receive opinions of Dr Williams and other vets.
As he has fever but no leucocytes it could be a viral infection, right?
As he take Pred since a while, the inflammatory process is
compromise and can explain the lymphopenia, right?
As the pred interferes with the production of insulin, it can explained
the hyperglycemia of yesterday, right?
As the SGPT is quite high, Victor can have liver dammage, right?
(You may remember that when Victor had a adrenal and pancreatic surgery,
the vet founded a mass in the liver.  He thought that it's was a
metastasis of a similar lesion in the pancreas.  But when we received the
histopathologic report, this particular pancreatic lesion was necrotic
tissu compatible with a steatitis.  But, as he didn't take a biopsy of the
liver lesion to confirm, we can't rule out his first hypothesis.)
This potential liver dammage can also explain that he had hyperglycemia
as the liver has a major contribution in the glycosis metabolism, right?
 
        Can it be a salmonella infection as describe in the book of James
Fox?  Victor can have been a chronic carrier after an initial infection
before I adopted him.  This first infection can have produced liver and
pancreas dammages and as the pred is immunosupressive, the bacteria can
become active again.  But with that hypothesis, I can't explain the lack
of leucocytes... (BTW I asked for a bacterial analysis of the feces, but
won't have the result before the end of the week and maybe only next
week...) And if it's a neoplasia, it can't explain the fever, right? Do
you have better hypothesis?  I know that as time will pass, I will have
answer.  But Victor is suffering and I feel guilty.  If it's a neoplasia,
I should put him to sleep.  If not...  What should I do...  Victor is such
a nice ferret...
        Sorry to have such a long post, Anne et...
 
             @-"-@              @---@               o__o
            ( 0-0 )            <=*"*=>             (. . )
---------oOO--\Y/--OOo------oOO--\o/--OOo------ooO--\v/--Ooo--------------
 
              Victor 8<         Hugo 8|           Adele :|
 
Anne Charbonneau        Faculte de medecine dentaire    Universite de Montreal
[log in to unmask]            Tel: (514) 343-5924
[log in to unmask]               Fax: (514) 343-2233
 
[Posted in FML issue 1251]