Shirley wrote: >Another thing that always cuts me to the quick is when folk write that >they started to give their ferrets Bob C's Chicken Gravy when it got >insulinoma. Now it wont go back to kibble any more. Would you go >back to a diet that was probably the cause of the disease in the first >place???? This is important, Shirley: the concept that carbohydrates in the diet are even *a* cause or *a contributing cause* for insulinoma has NOT been proven. It is a hypothesis, in fact it is based upon a group of about a half dozen hypotheses in a chain. Even in humans where more testing has occurred a lot of that is hypothetical, but in humans two recent studies (one huge and one very large) have knocked a lot of that thinking on its tush. Remember, that these hypotheses among the species, including the one for ferret insulinoma begin with hypotheses and partial studies involving diabetes (not insulinoma). I think that I posted about the huge study (the one with many thousands of older women) so check past posts, or look here: http://ferrethealth.org/archive/browse.php?msg=SG16475 about the Women's Health Initiative of the National Institutes of Health which recently released diabetes and diet findings from a huge study on human women, about 49,000 ranging from ages 50 to 79 over a space of 8 years. The more recent study was specifically on glycemic index and was headed by Dr. Elizabeth Mayer-Davis, a diabetes researcher at the University of South Carolina in Columbia with the study, published in the current British Journal of Nutrition, showing that there was no association between high-GI eating habits and elevated blood sugar among 813 adults who were followed over 5 years. > The findings, Mayer-Davis said, reinforce the notion that GI is > "simply not a good index of how food impacts blood sugar." Each is well worth looking up, even though we are talking very different species, because we are talking about the same core hypotheses. Check them out. Here is the most recent write-up work on the insulinoma hypothesis for ferrets by the concept's originator: Dr Mark Finkler, JEMM&S, volume 2.2, Dec 2004 Although he does tend to believe it he is very fair, very professional, and has a real researcher's attitude because he makes a strong point of letting people know how and why the various components are hypothetical. He also points out that the chain of hypotheses begins with diabetes work in cats, not insulinoma in ferrets. Personally, with some much new information being found about the pancreas (two new examples include functions of melatonin, and the presence of estradiol receptors) I think that it is well past time that people EMPHASIZE what is hypothetical and what is not in relation to insulinoma because the fact of the matter is that the actual causes are NOT known. They are hypothesized, but they are hypothesized from a concept which is turning out to be more full of holes than had been expected. That is not to say that there might not still be data there; there may be, but it could be different from what was anticipated. Might it still turn out that carbohydrates in the diet play a part? Sure. Might that not turn out to be the case? Also, sure. That is the very nature of hypotheses. Is there one heck of a lot still that is unknown about the pancreas? You can bet your booties on that one. The things that I always keep coming back to from my early years with ferrets is that insulinoma was virtually unknown a couple of decades ago and longer -- very, very rare -- and that included the people then who fed kibble as well as the people then who fed prey and milk sops, even in areas with "exotics" vets. Personally, I suspect that something changed. Was it the heavy breeding of so many fancies, especially those with neural crest genetics, in the U.S.? Perhaps. Certainly, the kit oncogene has been connected in other species with increased malignancy rates, if that is one of the more common neural crest variants in ferrets (and it might be. See: http://ferrethealth.org/archive/browse.php?msg=YG3069 , which is from a classical genetics professor and statistician, and see some posts in Ferret-Genetics: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ferret-Genetics/ , some of which are also from professional geneticists, both molecular and classical). Certainly, husbandry has changed, and even what is in homes has changed since the earlier years. There is a #$^&-load of variables unaccounted for. So, until there is actual, well challenged, rigorous testing it is really important to separate the choice to believe in a hypothesis until there is more data, from what is actually known. That is only most fair. We are all talking nothing more than hypotheses when it comes to discussing possible causes of insulinoma in ferrets, and THAT is the only thing which is actually KNOWN. Beyond that, we all each just trying our own bests with incomplete data, and that is all that anyone can do. Because the data are so incredibly fragmentary choices will vary, and there is nothing wrong with that. Heck, that is why the topic is so worth discussion in the first place. Right? -- Sukie (not a vet) Ferret Health List co-moderator http://www.smartgroups.com/groups/ferrethealth FHL Archives fan http://ferrethealth.org/archive/ replacing http://fhl.sonic-weasel.org International Ferret Congress advisor http://www.ferretcongress.org [Posted in FML issue 5187]