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Originally Posted by Teegy  Do you have some research information or case studies to show the rise and let people see the dangers. It would also be great for the uninformed if you could provide details of exactly what it is, what it does and what people should look out for, when does it usually present itself and what steps should hey take.
The only case study I could find was out of the RSPCA in the UK. 6 Special Considerations for Older Pets |
Teegy I believe that PLOS one study was posted in another thread, but if you go to my thread Spay and Neuter - when or if ever, in the General Forum you will see the link to the Viszla study - which shows surprising low rates of mammary cancer and pyrometra.
There could be some sort of breed genetic protection against this *I suppose* but more studies need to be done to understand this.
Same thread different link this one to the *Irreverant Vet* and his review of the medical literature vs a vs health benefits and risks to the S/N question.
In there he explains that the study most often quoted to show this *marked* increase in mammary tumours is most often mis-quoted and mis understood. Apparently the risk of
any mammary tumour is 1-3 in 100 dogs! Further more the study shows that of all mammary tumours diagnosed 50/50 is the ratio to benign to cancerous in dogs, in cats it is almost 100% cancerous but not Dogs. So let us take these two stats together and what you have is a .5- 1.5% chance of having a female dog with a cancerous mammary tumour. Pretty low odds, how-ever yes these odds go up with the number of heats a female has but what-ever % increase per heat would go like this :
If the study said that the risk increases after one heat by 10% then now your female has .55-1.65% of having mammary cancer according to this study. If after second heat the risk of cancer increases by 20% then the odds are now .60-1.8% again we are not talking about a huge risk.
It is my understanding that pyrometra is the more relevant concern, especially in un-bred intact older 4-5+yr old females - pyrometra is very rare in young females although it does occur. It is why many many breeders will spay their females once they are done breeding them.
The decision to s/n your dog, is turning out (as it probably always truly was) one that is more nuanced then many folks believe. There is no Band-Aid one treatment fits all approach at this point in time - in fact there never was. More recent research and just as importantly the apparent public interest in this more recent research is telling us that much more research is necessary, and that there appears to be some definite health risks along with health benefits to the S/N question.
It becomes more complicated when you look at different purebreds as for some there are compelling arguments to at least delay the S/N for some time. pstinard found one with small/toy dogs in it, but it was mainly looking at ACL or CCL tears.
At this point in time, we have not one study I have found that was a comprehensive one in toy breed dogs, that looked at a significant number of the population across a broad diversity of concerns versus benefits.
In terms specific to the Yorkshire Terrier given the zero research on this question specific to our breed, all that can guide us, is what research has been done in the past on multiple different breeds. And that research tells us there is no overt health benefit to neutering a male, and the highest risk to the female is probably pyrometra.