All Yorkies are at risk of having problems with anesthesia. It's a breed thing. Yorkies that weigh less than 4.5# have an increased risk of having problems with anesthesia during surgery, due to the relative size of their livers. The older and bigger they are, the risk decreases. Also, some will be more likely (than other breeds) to have adverse reactions to the anesthesia. I applaud your vet for wanting to wait to do her spay. It sounds like he really knows what he's doing. I cringe whenever I hear about Yorkies being spayed under 1 year old. The only reason they do it so early now is because so many irresponsible owners (of all breeds) were
failing to bring their female dogs back to the vet when they turned 1 year old and many ended up having litters prior to being spayed. So the trend became doing it earlier to prevent all the unwanted puppies from being born. So, the absolute safest thing to do for Miss Jillie is wait and see if she gets any bigger. Here's a post I did from a previous thread:
Yorkshire terriers are sensitive to Anesthesia (especially those weighing 4.5 pounds or less). Only use gas inhalants isoflurane or sevoflurane. They recover from it faster. You may have to request and/or insist this be done, and the vet may want to charge you more because it's more expensive. They may have an allergic reaction to anesthesia. Discuss this with your vet, so that they can be prepared. There are many breeds of dogs and vets sometimes forget which ones have which problems.
Spaying a female dog is a major abdominal surgery as opposed to a neuter, where the incision goes only skin deep. Gas inhalants iso or sevo only. Spaying and neutering dogs will prevent cancers later in life, ie prostrate, mammary tumors, and pyometra (infection of the uterus). It helps with behavioral issues also. Do some research.
Spaying and neutering used to be done when the pet was a year old. They changed this because many dogs were becoming pregnant in their first heat, and owners would forget to schedule the surgery. So to avoid many unwanted puppies, they started to do these surgeries earlier. It is okay and safer to wait until your pup is older.
Have pre-op bloodwork done. Check the liver enzymes. If they are high, cancel the surgery. The liver is what removes the anesthsia from the dog. If these enzymes are high, this could indicate a liver problem, and make recovery difficult or impossible. This problem will need to be resolved before surgery or dental treatments.
Do not combine surgeries. You don't want to keep a dog under anesthesia for too long of a time. Multiple short surgeries are safer than one long one. To pull a couple loose teeth is one thing, but don't approve a 30 minute dental cleaning added onto spay surgery time. It is too long to keep a Yorkie under anesthesia for.
Please do not assume your vet knows everything. Nothing against vets, but sometimes they get busy. If your chart has a big sticker on it the says 'anesthesia sensitivity' or allergies, it will get noticed, and special procedures for Yorkies will be followed.
And a story: When my first Yorkie had a minor surgery to remove a small lump on her head, she almost died. They gave a knock down drug to intubate her, but as they were trying to get her to go deep enough, she was fighting the anesthesia, (natural reaction of the body in wild (er) animals), and they ended up increasing it too much and boom: emergency situation, she finally went under, but went too far and heartrate went way down, but they were quick to reverse it and were able to bring her HR up and stablized, enough to do the surgery. Scary! I was training as a vet tech at the time, and was in the room and watching as all this was happening.
Also: find out if they will be keeping her overnight, and if yes, will someone be there with her? If they do it early in the day, they may let you take her home at night. If so, stay up, and if she is groggy, don't let her sleep continually until she is no longer woozie. They can go to sleep and with anesthesia still in their system some go to Rainbow Bridge for a visit and forget to come back. Wake her every 30 minutes or so until she acts normal. Offer small amounts of water at a time, and chicken baby food would be good to have on hand for a day or so after the surgery. Keep her warm, and keep checking that she's comfy, not to hot or too cold. As the anesthesia wears off she'll be better able to maintain her own temperature. |