I posted a few days ago about Grendel having bloody stools; here's the
rest of the story.
 
We had taken him to an emergency vet that night.  The vet gave him a shot
of Baytril, a bit of Maalox, and gave us instructions to take him to our
regular vet the next day.
 
So, we pack him up again and took him off to the animal hospital the next
morning.  It happened to be Dr. Bock's day off and we didn't have a set
appointment, so we left him until Dr. Mayo could take a look at him later.
We picked him up later that night and the vet tech (the doctor was gone
because we couldn't pick him up until after the clinic was closed) told us
he had an infection, but it was nothing to worry about.  WE were given
Albon suspension with instructions to give him .5 cc twice a day.  He was
rather subdued that evening, but we put it down to two vet trips in two
days and just feeling kind of icky.
 
During late afternoon of the next day, I noticed he was extremely
sluggish, his gums and nose were very white, his breathing was labored, and
his tongue and feet were cold.  I called the animal hospital and left a
message for Dr. Bock as he was busy.  He called back, and after listening
to his symptoms, told us to start him on Maalox three times a day, Pedilyte
every two hours, and put him on a heating pad.  He also told us to call him
the next morning so Dr. Bock would know how he was doing.
 
He was much worse the next morning, so off we went to the animal hospital
again, this time with Grendel wrapped in a towel and not even curious
about his surroundings.  (Very unusual for our normally
hell-bent-for-leather bouncy baby ferret.)  Dr. Bock checked him over and
didn't at all like what he saw.  When he took Grendel's tempature, the
thermometer came out covered in blood, so he used that as a culture.  The
microscope showed a coccidia infection, but Dr. Bock didn't think that
could be causing all the problems and suspected a viral infection also.
Dr. Bock admitted him to the hospital in order to put him on an IV and
more closely monitor his condition.
 
The IV fluids and antibiotics seemed to improve his condition overnight.
His nose and gums became a little more pink and his breathing was easier,
but he was still pretty depressed.  During the night he passed some more
bloody stools, and about 6:30 this morning his breathing again became
labored.  Dr. Bock gave him Karafate and Sel-somthing-or-other along with
fluids.  Grendel went back to sleep.  Around 8:30, he vomited blood mixed
with Karafate (this was the first time he had vomited during this whole
episode).  He then went back to sleep.  He never woke back up, and died
approximately two hours later.
 
At this point, we have no real idea as to the cause of death.  He
obviously had some rather massive ulceration of the digestive tract.  Dr.
Bock asked if it were possible if he got into cleaning fluid or something
like that, and while there is an outside chance, it is unlikely.  Kirk
searched the house and could find nothing spilled or bottles chewed open,
and Grendel hadn't learned how to open the cabinets yet.  Dr. Bock
suggested an autopsy, and Kirk agreed, as we have 5 others who were
exposed to him at length, and we want to rule out anything contagious as
well as find out exactly why he died.
 
We are planning to let the breeder he came from know of the problem, in
case it is congenital, but there isn't much else for us to do at this point
except grieve.
 
Michelle
 
--
Meet my pets.  The ferrets (Taz, Coffee, Daphne, Tia, and Gretchen), the
gerbils (31 permanent residents and various babies), the zebra mouse
(Racer), the rats (Timmy, Sue, Princess, Brownie and Perrin), the budgie
(Sky), the cockatiel (Snow), and the fish (various).  RIP Honey, Summer
[Posted in FML issue 1311]