Pre-Surgery Screening Could Save Pet's Life
BY DR. DON PALERMO
Knight Ridder Newspapers
(KRT) - Could this happen to you? You leave your 6-month-old boxer to
be spayed. You took up all the food and water the night before and
dropped her off for her surgery at your local veterinary hospital.
The kids were impatient and your job called so you hurriedly listened
to a vet-technician explain the benefits of performing a pre-
anesthetic testing on Marty, your boxer, prior to surgery. Your
budget was close this month so you declined the recommended testing
and hurried out the door to meet the rest of the day.
As noon approaches you receive a phone call that Marty is in shock
after surgery. She was apparently anemic prior to surgery and an
otherwise uneventful spay had turned into a very serious situation.
After receiving a pint of blood and a liter of intravenous fluids,
Marty was beginning to stabilize and it looked like she was going to
make a full recovery. As her owner, you are shocked the veterinarian
was not aware of the possible problem prior to surgery. It was then
that the light bulb went off and you remembered that you had declined
any pre-anesthetic testing.
The concept that most young animals will do well regardless,
therefore risks are lower, making pre-anesthetic testing unnecessary
is not a sound philosophy. It is not just about preventing anesthetic
deaths, which are fortunately less common in most veterinary
practices today, but it is more about reducing the surgical cases
that just don't seem to recover as quickly or the cases that require
several owner call backs.
Can you imagine your physician giving you an option to have your
blood analyzed before you had your hernia repaired or before surgery
was performed to eliminate your kidney stones? No way. Just the
liability aspect would prevent any human hospital from ever
proceeding without the tests. Try to decline your personal blood work
before your next surgery and see how quickly your surgery will be
canceled. It just makes good sense to see how your own well-being is
before you are subjected to anesthesia.
The same is true for your pet. Wouldn't you want to know that your
pet was in as good a physical condition as possible before they were
put under general anesthesia?
There are some conditions which could make delaying or avoiding an
elective surgery sensible. Your pet could be found to be anemic as
discussed earlier in this article. Elevated white blood cells (WBCs)
may identify a respiratory infection requiring antibiotics seven to
10 days before anesthesia can be given. A low platelet count could
indicate an inability for blood to clot post-operatively. Older dogs
and cats are far more prone to kidney or liver disease. Knowing pre-
existing problems or abnormalities enable the veterinary surgeon to
take special methods or to cancel certain surgeries until the lab-
detected problem can be alleviated. I've often used the
expression "Let's not win the battle but lose the war." What good is
it to have a successful surgery and deal with a myriad of problems
after the surgery is finished?
By opting to have your pet tested prior to surgical anesthesia, you
place less stress on the support staff and the veterinary surgeon
performing the task, and, most of all, you enhance the probability
that your pet's surgery will be uncomplicated and uneventful.
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(Dr. Don Palermo is a veterinarian at Bienville Animal Medical Center
in Ocean Springs, Miss.
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© 2004, The Sun Herald (Biloxi, Miss.).
http://www.animalconcerns.org/external.htmlwww=http3A//www.fortwayne.c
om/mld/newssentinel/7808865.htm&itemid=200401272027170.0885577
Posted on SHARE Yahoo group Jan 28, 2004