Many owners are apprehensive about having their pet dog, cat, or rabbit, spayed or neutered. Their primary concerns surround the risks of general anesthesia, that they may ultimately want to breed their companion animal, and that the procedure may change the personality of the pet. We would like to address these concerns.
Ovariohysterectomy (surgical removal of the uterus and ovaries) and neutering (surgical removal of the testes) are major surgeries that necessitate a general anesthesia. Anesthetic risks are minimized by performing pre-surgical examinations and pre-screening all surgical candidates with complete blood tests that verify healthy organ function. We place all patients on intravenous fluids to support their cardiovascular system throughout the surgery and to clear drugs from the patients system more quickly. We use modern anesthetic drugs custom tailored to your pet’s individual needs. We have trained veterinary technicians using state of the art monitoring equipment throughout the entire surgery. With these precautions in place the risk of a complication is extremely low. The benefits of surgery far outweigh the rare risk.
The many benefits of proceeding with a spay or neuter fall into three categories:
1) Medical
2) Behavioural
3) Ethical.
The medical benefits in females include the elimination of common life threatening uterine infections and cancers of the uterus and ovaries, the greatly reduced incidence of breast cancer, and the prevention of messy heat cycles. In males the risk of common testicular cancers is eliminated and the incidence of painful prostate diseases, anal tumors, and hernias are greatly reduced.
The behavioural benefits of reducing sexual hormones by spaying or neutering is the reduction of the dangerous desire to escape and roam wild in search of a mate, and decreasing sexual tendencies such as mounting, and dominance associated aggression. Surgically altering a pet doesn’t change its personality, instincts, intelligence, playfulness or affection, nor is it responsible for the obesity epidemic amongst the pet population. Obesity in most cases is the result of overfeeding and lack of exercise, and can be regulated by diet and physical activity.
The ethical advantage of spaying and neutering is that the local shelters are over populated with animals and by not breeding pets we increase the chances of placing these deserving creatures into loving homes.
Animals are never too old to be spayed or neutered. Please call to schedule your pet in for this potentially live saving surgery.
