pet connection

In this week’s syndicated newspaper feature, Pet Connection advisory board member Dr. Timothy C. McCarthy, a board-certified surgeon in the Portland, Ore., area who has pioneered the application of many minimally invasive diagnostic and therapeutic techniques that are now becoming the standard of care, talks about “The Kindest Cut” — a better way to spay.

The first spaying I ever watched was in a small rural practice in 1958 when I was 13 — the same time I first became interested in veterinary medicine.

The surgery was performed using ether and catgut suture from a spool that had to be manually threaded onto a needle. There was no surgical cap, mask, gown or gloves, and only a postage stamp-sized surgical drape. There was no pain medication, and the ovaries were pulled up to the incision by tearing their attachment to the abdominal wall. This was the state of the art at that time.

Today, nearly all aspects of spaying have improved. We have better anesthetics that have minimal negative effects on the patient. We use individual sterile packages of suture with attached needles made using the same synthetic suture material used in human surgery, which causes minimal tissue reaction and is completely removed by the body with time.

We also use caps, masks, gloves and gowns, and use drapes of adequate size to prevent any contamination of the surgical field. We no longer need to pour antibacterial agents into the surgery site. Aggressive pain management with drug combinations is used before surgery to block pain before it starts, and the medications are continued during the post-operative period.

However, we are still using the same barbaric blind tissue-tearing technique to rip the attachment of the ovaries away from the abdominal wall. This technique does work — because we’ve been spaying dogs and cats this way for more than 50 years. But now there is a better way: laparoscopic spaying. It changes our technique from tearing tissue blindly to cutting tissue where we can see what we are doing, and it is the final step toward achieving modernization of this surgery.

Can our pets be windows into understanding human obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)? From Dr. Marty Becker and Mikkel Becker:

“Like people can have compulsive behaviors, such as famously washing their hands until their skin is raw, animals can have similar behaviors,” veterinary behaviorist Dr. Nicholas Dodman, director of the Behavior Clinics at Tufts University’s Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine in North Grafton, Mass., told the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants 2011 Conference in April.

“We’re on our way to proving compulsive behaviors may be genetic,” Dodman said. “If it’s true in dogs, there’s a good bet it’s true in people.”

Compulsive disorders in dogs are associated with what they were bred to do. Dogs bred to chase prey or herd are more likely to chase shadows or light. Research in Dobermans with flank sucking has shown a link between their behavior and a specific alteration on a chromosome for dogs with this disorder. Some cats, primarily Oriental breeds, such as Siamese, may compulsively suck on fabric, a behavior commonly called “wool-sucking.”

All this and more in the complete feature, here!

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This week’s Pet Connection newspaper feature was written by our own Kim Campbell Thornton:

Remember when you got that bundle of puppy love? Remember when you took him to training class, to the beach, on that road trip? Remember when he spent a whole week just snuggling with you in bed when you had the flu and he brought all his toys to help you feel better?

If you’ve ever loved an old dog or have one who is approaching his golden years, you have lots of “remember whens.” And you can have lots more with the help of “Good Old Dog: Expert Advice for Keeping Your Aging Dog Happy, Healthy and Comfortable “ (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $26), a compendium of science, stories, myth-busting and more information than you might have known existed about the care and companionship of aging dogs. Compiled by veterinary experts at Tufts University’s Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine and edited by Tufts veterinary behaviorist Dr. Nicholas Dodman, the comprehensive tome covers everything from behavioral changes to expect and recognizing signs of potential problems to making health care and end-of-life decisions.

How long can dogs live? A lot longer than you might think, Dodman says.

“Here at the veterinary school, we see about 8,000 old dogs per year out of our caseload of about 24,000. The oldest one we had on record was 21, but I know dogs can make it to 22 or 23.”

Get the complete scoop on your old dog, and read what Kim has to say about “The Complete Cat’s Meow: Everything You Need to Know About Caring for Your Cat” by Pet Connection BFF Darlene Arden, too, right here.

Also in this week’s feature, Dr. Marty Becker and Mikkel Becker take a look at the feline skeleton:

No one can definitively say how many bones a cat has. A long-tailed Maine Coon cat will have more vertebrae than a Manx with no tail, or a Manx mix with just part of a tail. And a cat with extra toes — they’re called polydactyl — will have extra bones as a result. The range is usually between 230 and 250, with the average cat counting about 244 bones, if cats could or cared to count. Anyway you count it, the average cat has about 30 more bones than we have. But we have something cats don’t: collarbones. Not that a cat would consider that a disadvantage. Without a collarbone, a cat can fit his body through an opening the size of his head. Assuming he isn’t overweight, of course.

All this and more in the complete feature, here!

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In this week’s Pet Connection newspaper feature, award-winning pet author, feline behavior expert and Pet Connection BFF Amy Shojai tackles the tough topic of feline clawing and scratching:

A top reason cats lose their homes is destructive scratching when furniture trumps the cat-owner bond. People bonded with a cat put up with more household damage before resorting to ditching the kitty — but it can still happen. Understanding why a cat scratches — and how easy it is to prevent damage to furniture — helps keep cats in their homes.

Clawing is an instinctive behavior that can’t be stopped. While some felines are claw-maniacs and others are less demanding of scratch-time, all cats claw for physical, emotional and social reasons.

Clawing provides exercise to stretch shoulder and foreleg muscles, and it keeps nails healthy. Scent pads in kitty paws leave invisible smell-cues of ownership. The marks also serve as feline Post-it Notes to warn away other cats from prime feline real estate. That’s why single-cat households may create less claw-trauma than multipet homes, where each cat vies for territory and attention. Cats also claw to comfort themselves during times of stress.

To keep clawing on-target, give your cat legal outlets for this natural behavior. Offer irresistible options while making forbidden objects undesirable. Watch your cat and he’ll tell you his scratch preferences. The surface (wood, sisal, carpet), preferred shape (vertical or horizontal), and location are vital. Spiking the new object with catnip helps promote feline allegiance. (Read more…)

And from Dr. Marty Becker and Mikkel Becker:

Cancer deaths in both dogs and humans can be reduced dramatically by a reduction in the consumption of omega-6 fatty acids and in maintaining ideal body weight. The research, by veterinarian Dr. Demian Dressler, was presented at the Institute of Food Technologists annual meeting. Dr. Dressler recommends severely limiting snack foods that contain ingredients rich in omega-6, such as corn oil, vegetable oil and grain-fed red meat. Too much omega-6 fatty acid can lead to inflammation, which creates an environment conducive to the development of cancer. As for weight, obesity cuts the production of a hormone that inhibits the growth of cancerous cells. The findings stress the importance of proper diet and weight for both people and pets.

Read all of this week’s Pet Connection here!

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In this week’s Pet Connection newspaper feature, our own Kim Campbell Thornton gives you the inside story on just what “natural” and “organic” mean on pet food labels.

It sounds great when your dog’s or cat’s food is described as “natural” or “organic,” doesn’t it? It’s easy to imagine happy cows and chickens being raised sustainably on Farmer Jan’s property. The real definitions don’t have anything to do with how farm animals are raised or the quality of the food, though. In the eyes of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the term “natural” does not have an official definition. It simply means that a pet food does not contain artificial flavors, colors or preservatives.

The Association of American Feed Control Officials, a trade organization that develops nutrient standards and ingredient definitions for pet foods, says a “natural” food or ingredient is one that is made only from plant, animal or mined sources and is not produced by or subject to a chemically synthetic process. Foods described as natural may not contain anything artificial, except in amounts that might occur unavoidably during manufacture. The AAFCO says the term “natural” should be used only to describe products when all of the ingredients — not counting chemically synthesized vitamins, minerals and other trace nutrients — meet this definition.

Get the full scoop here — along with all the news about “Your Dog: The Owner’s Manual,” the BIG Bus Tour, and of course, Dr. Marty Becker’s $70,000 shelter prize giveaway, in this week’s Pet Connection!

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Pets with all kinds of mobility problems, from paralysis to pain to weakeness, are finding new hope. From Dr. Robin Downing in this week’s Pet Connection newspaper feature:

When Frankie was hit by a car on the streets of Denver, two vertebrae in his midback were shattered, and his spinal cord was crushed. At that moment he became a permanent paraplegic, never to walk normally again. In times past, he would have been euthanized.

Fortunately for Frankie — and for other pets with special needs — times have changed. No longer are mobility issues an impediment to an excellent quality of life. In fact, dogs and cats — and even unusual pets such as rabbits and ferrets — can be fitted for assistive devices that allow them to sustain the activities they’ve become accustomed to. Pet owners can be taught how to manage their pets’ bodily functions. And the pets themselves can easily be taught to accept the use of the various assistive devices that are currently available. (Read more…)

And “The Buzz” from Dr. Marty Becker and Mikkel Becker:

Two fingers on a dog’s muzzle can stop her from shaking water all over after a bath. That’s one of hundreds of secrets, surprises and solutions in the new “Your Dog: The Owner’s Manual” by the Pet Connection’s Dr. Marty Becker and Gina Spadafori.

You can read all this and more in this week’s Pet Connection!

Photo of Jessie the Pembroke corgi by Dr. Robin Downing.

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