Marcuz’ Vet Visit

 

Marcuz was great until Saturday morning after breakfast. It is still unclear as to what happened. I fed both him and Manny their breakfast and went to do some chores for about an hour.

Returning to let them out for playtime only to find Marcuz laying on the bottom of cage in an awkward position and unable to move his front paws or hold his head upright.

I gently picked him up and carefully checked to see if I could find anything wrong. The only thing Marcuz did was flinch a couple of times along with grinding his teeth, a sign of pain, but I couldn’t feel anything out of place.

I then placed Marcuz in the travel tote I have for the boys which has a nice fleece bed and a soft blanket in it. I heated up one of my handmade rice packs and put that in with him as well. That seemed to help him relax enough that his paws were no longer sticking straight out as if he was part of a zombie movie.

So started our long weekend of Rescue® Remedy, heat and ice, gentle massage, and range of motion. Marcuz slept a lot more than normal for a ferret but I am sure that the pain wore him out.

I know the whole weekend wore me out as Marcuz wasn’t able to move himself well I had to reposition him every few hours so his skin didn’t break down as well.  I also had to hold him upright so he could go to the bathroom.

A ferret lifts his tail over his rump and uses it like a pump to release the waste matter and food should travel from mouth to rear in 3-4 hours.

Roomie offered to watch Marcuz while I slept a little bit. The nap I took helped to refresh me and cleared my mind enough to realize that our vet has something called Pet Portal which allows you to ask questions and request appointments. Only thing was they had changed the format since the last time I had used it. I filled out a form and submitted it.

By Monday Marcuz didn’t want eat anything but furo-tone®  and Greenies® and I still hadn’t been able to find a ride to the vet’s. Nor could I get through to talk to some one at the vet’s office.

I asked a friend if she could take me to the vet’s on Tuesday as that was when I had requested the appointment only to find out she had appointments of her own.

Tuesday brought on a new problem green diarrhea which can indicate a nasty bug called ECE. Ferret owners call it the green slime disease more on that in another post.

Tuesday night I hadn’t heard back from the vet office so I went back to the Pet Portal and it was then I realized that I had filled out the wrong form. I submitted the right form and heard from the vet office the next morning and was given an appointment time that worked for my friend as well.

Wednesday afternoon had us at the vet’s office. Gave the tech the stool sample. She had never seen ferret poop and trying to accurately describe it was a challenge.

She asked if I had any problems holding Marcuz while she took his temperature. Ferrets will poop if something startles them by touching their anus and Marcuz pooped a lot of green slimey poop his temp was elevated. What I didn’t know was green poop will stain things. Next she weighed Marcuz and he is a 2.5 pound boy.

Then we had to wait for the vet. Who let me know right away that she wasn’t overly knowledgeable about ferrets and felt I should try another vet that might be more so. The ones I know about are another fifty plus miles away from me in any direction and impossible to get to without transportation of my own.

She then examined Marcuz from head to toe and asked my opinion about getting an X-ray done of his spine which I told her I wanted done to rule out possible breaks or dislocations.

Marcuz did great and I forgot my camera so I couldn’t take a picture of the awesome X-ray of his spine and what it revealed.

 

This is not of Marcuz but it shows the skeletal system well. Note where the neck, front leg, and back are.

Note the spacing between each vertebrae or disk. It is approximately 1/8th of an inch apart. Marcuz’ X-ray revealed a narrowing of the space between the disk just after his shoulder and the next one in his back.

While it doesn’t appear to be pinching a nerve it is causing some issues with his front legs and neck.

But the prognosis is good for a full recovery provided I can keep Marcuz from doing what ferrets do best which is running, climbing, jumping, and basically doing everything for the next couple of weeks.

He is also on four different types of medications. Two for his green slime and two for his back. 

As of this writing his green slimey poop is getting back to normal ferret poop color and consistency and his energy level is raising.  He is also using his front paws more and is able to use the litter box on his own.

Because I have to limit his movement he has been upgraded from the tote to the boys travel carrier. Where he has access to water, food, a soft bed and his litter box. His play time for the moment consists of massage, range of motion to his front legs and lots of love and petting.

The vet said it maybe a one time thing but more than likely it could happen again and it might not have happened on Saturday but could have happened months before and Marcuz either moved wrong or Manny landed on him the wrong way when they were playing in the cage.

Cost of going to the vet for an emergency was almost two hundred dollars. Half of that is Marcuz’ medication of which I get to wear pretty pink polka dots of amoxicillin at least once a day.

Disclosure: The X-ray photo do not belong to me but to Ferret Health and Long Beach Animal Hospital

Have a Chittering Good Day,

Jo