I'm thinking ahead as our pup is nearly 7 months old and she will be spayed after her first season. My question is:-Should I opt for laparoscopic procedure or traditional surgical method? Of course I am aware of the price difference, but what surprised me was our Vet's comments. Our vet said that, for our dog, the laparoscopic procedure was not necessary and she would cope fine with a surgical incision, reason being she is not too large. I don't want to put her in pain, but perhaps laparoscopy is not required? I would love to hear what others in the forum did, thank you as the comments are always useful!
Hi ,my little rescue girl was spayed in June . My Vet doesn't offer the laparoscopy method , so we didn't have a choice . Have to say though, that she recovered extremely well indeed without any issues , so had I had a choice ? Well , I truly don't know ! Sorry, that's not much help is it ! x
I can give a human example. My OH had a Whipple which is major abdominal surgery, laprascopically. We were told the surgery itself takes much longer but healing time is dramatically shortened. So I think a consideration would be time under anaesthetic which is not usually a concern for young patients of any species. OH had three small holes as so much had to be cut AND one larger hole. The larger hole was needed to take the excised stuff out of him. OH still had pain, there are still cuts. Keep in mind that while spay is an invasive surgery it is not as dramatic as a whipple. Me, I would seriously consider lapracsopic for the healing time being shortened. Especially for a cat if it 's possible (yes I know you are talking about a dog) Cats are much harder to keep quiet and not jumping and opening up a surgery site. Lap. will cost more so if that's a consideration, well, thousands of animals have done just fine with the old method. Asky your Vet how many Lap he.she has done, the difference in pain, healing time, incision size, time udner.
Poppy was spayed laparoscopically. What I really liked about it (apart from the bill!) was the tiny little cut. She came home wearing a vest, but we took it straight off and she didn't even have to wear a cone. Also, we agreed with the surgeon that he would only remove the ovaries but leave the uterus, and as I understand it the laparoscopic spay causes less trauma, and means less danger of intontinence later.
I think it depends on the individual, and you will never know if the other procedure would have suited better or not. Belle had a traditional spay, a rather large incision as it was complicated, she bounced back next day, no cone or covering needed, no painkillers to take home, stitches out a week later. She was fully continent all her life.
Molly is going for her laparoscopic spay in a couple of weeks. We thought long and hard about it, we also are using another vet practice because ours doesn't do them. Our usual vet did spend time talking to us about it though. He says with surgical methods these days the usual spay, taking the uterus and ovaries is not as serious an operation as it used to be. After consideration though, we are going for the laparoscopic. It seems to me to be less brutal than the usual spay and of course the much faster recovery is good. This practice did tell us when we discussed it with them that they have a good look around with the laparoscope and if they think there is any concern at all, they will do a full spay. Best wishes with your decision.
The laparoscopic spay method was not available at our vet so we had to have the traditional, except for that the only removed her ovaries and not her uterus (she was spayed before her first season at about 7 months - we were going to wait till 8 months but it lined up well with a long weekend so I added some leave to that and I could be home with her in case of complications). She was dopey the first night but by the end of the second day she was well on her way to being her normal self. She recovered very well and you have to search for the scar on her abdomen, it is so small and neat. We also took the oppurtunity to have her elbows and hips xrayed because she did not come from a good home and we had no idea if everything was okay, and she was going to be under anaesthetic anyway. For us it was all good and minimally upsetting for Harley.
I have had 3 girls (2 newfs and a lab) all spayed abdominally and all bounced back quickly with no problems at all.
The Laparoscopic spay wasn't available here but my last bitch to be spayed had barely an inch incision.
My girl is booked in for a lap spay, at a different vet to mine coz mine only does the normal spay. I did a lot of reading about it and the only issue in favour of the full spay, for me, is that my vet is 2 mins away rather than the half hour to the vet offering lap spay. A lap spay is less invasive, less rummaging around inside, less post-op pain, quicker recovery. I read that with a normal spay dogs should be walked for two weeks on leash but with a lap spay it's a couple of days. Pippa, the editor of this forum, wrote about her girls having lap spays, I don't know the link to it but I may have just searched 'laparoscopic spays' and found it. It was a really helpful read for me.
