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One of the most important preventive health decisions you can make is to spay or neuter your cat or dog. In addition to reducing overpopulation, studies show that pets live longer and healthier lives when they have been spayed or neutered. There are many conditions, sometimes life threatening, that can be eliminated by spaying and neutering your family pet.
SPAY SURGERY
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Spaying includes removing the ovaries and uterus of a female animal, which helps eliminate many reproductive related complications and provides lifelong health benefits. Some of these complications are mammary cancer, a potentially fatal form of cancer, and pyometra, a life threatening infection of the uterus.
A female cat or dog spayed before her first heat will have a near zero chance of developing mammary cancer. Spaying is also important to pets who already have obvious tumors. This is because many mammary tumors are stimulated by estrogens. By removing the ovaries, which is the source of estrogens, it will help slow the spread of tumors.
Pyometra is the life-threatening infection of the uterus that generally occurs in middle-aged and older females in the six weeks following heat. The uterus with pyometra swells dramatically and is filled with pus, bacteria, dying tissue, and toxins. Without treatment, the pet would die. Despite her serious medical state, she must be spayed quickly if her life is to be saved.
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NEUTER SURGERY
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Neutering includes removing the testicles of your male dog or cat, which helps regulate the kind of hormonal surges that can cause hyper-activity, urine marking, irritability and aggression, and can vastly improve his mood and behavior. Just as with spaying, neutering also has many health benefits.
One of the most important concerns is the prostate gland, which under the influence of testosterone will gradually enlarge over the course of the dog’s life. By middle age, it is usually significantly enlarged in an unneutered male dog. As the dog ages, his prostate is likely to become uncomfortable, possibly being large enough to interfere with defecation. The prostate under the influence of testosterone is also predisposed to infection, which is almost impossible to clear up without neutering. Neutering causes the prostate to shrink. One other health concern is testicular cancer. Once the testicles are removed, the chance of testicular cancer is gone.
In cats, many undesirable behaviors can be reduced with neutering. These include, roaming, fighting and urine marking which are reduced more than 90% after neutering.
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As with all surgeries, the emphasis starts with patient safety. All of our surgeries require pre-surgical bloodwork to help identify any irregularities and help us ensure the best outcome possible. Surgeries to spay or neuter your pet are outpatient procedures, and most pets recover quickly and are able to go home by late afternoon. All patients go home with an e-collar to keep the pets from licking or chewing at their incisions and pain medication. As the pet parent, your job is to commit to good post-operative home care, by checking the incision daily and restricting exercise until any staples or stitches are removed, normally 14 days later.
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