questions about spay/neuter

fist i want to say i couldn't think of a better place to put this so it would be noticed quicker. if there is a better place please move it thank you!!

ok... I am taking my 2 cats in Tuesday morning to be fixed. I have a female about 1 year old and a 6 month old male. Don't worry they have been seperated for several weeks i feel horrible for it but i had to because i couldn't get an appt. till the 14th. She is not his mother she has never had any kittens and i never planned to have a male he was supposed to be a she when he came home to me and the person was wrong.

on to my questions... My female has been in heat all week this week she normally goes like a human period lol about once a month for about 6/7 days. She doesn't appear to be as high strung today or whiney today she may be coming out of it. Will they still fix her if she is just coming out of it? what if she doesn't come out of it before she goes in?

Secondly I have the option for 2 kinds of pain meds. homeopathic and conventional, the conventional is a 3 day supply per cat called tramadol,the homeopathic is a 15 day supply that is shared between the 2 cats called traumeel. Which is the best option?

please don't be harsh on me waiting till they were older. I have 4 children to feed and we are a one income home times are tough and i didn't expect to get a male. Both of my cats are strictly indoors and both have had their shots. I would have done it sooner if money hadn't been an issue.

Hi, I would let the vet know that she was in heat last week. Many vets will do a spay anyway but good to know before surgery.

Most of the males do fine without any extended pain medication. Ask to make sure they are given a pain injection at the surgery time. Many vets do this routinely.

The pain medication that is used in my area is buprenex. A dose has a long lasting affect and it does not have the gastrointestinal upset that some have. It also works quickly. Maybe ask the vet if they use that.

I am not familiar with Tramadol other than it is an anti-inflamitory drug used in some for arthritis pain.

For me personally, I would take the short term pain meds. By two weeks everyone should be feeling fine.

Well wishes for everyone on Tuesday.

I am sorry in reading the consent forms it says tramadol but on the website for the vet office it does say buprinex for cats. Tramadol is for dogs lol!!!! I guess the registration papers aren't big enough to include everything.

http://www.aceofspays.com/index.htm

this is the place they are going it is a low cost spay/neuter clinic and i got an even lower fee through a low income organization. It is going to cost me $35 for female and 25 for male.

it does say on the site they are given something that will last 6-8 hours after leaving but i wanna be sure they are comfy during healing. So i will buy it when i am there so i don't have to end up going back. This place is over a half hour away from me.


forgot to add my cause for questioning is if i buy the buprinex it will cost me $22 per cat but homeopathic bottle will be enough for both in one bottle at $22. Thats why i wanted to know which was better.

What a great price on the spay/neuter!! Congratulations for getting them fixed.

Males recover from surgery a lot quicker than females, as the surgery is not so invasive. I've not tried homeopathic pain relievers so sorry, cannot help you with that. Most of the spay/neuters that I've done have been for feral cats, which are released fairly quickly back into their environment with no pain medication at all. For my house cats, my youngest is 6 years old and frankly I don't remember what they took when they were fixed but I honestly don't recall giving any pain meds to the males. My vet at the time had a philosophy that if they aren't feeling a little bit of pain, that they will be more active, which is not what you want them to do after surgery. I know others will strongly disagree with that choice.

The vet may charge extra if she's still in heat at the time of the surgery (not completely sure why, I guess it's more complicated with things going on in the female parts region), but they can still spay her that way. I know this because I've looked because, whenever I have a chance to get my cats done, it's going to have to be right then whether they're yowling or not.

My cats are older than yours (about 3yo) and I still haven't gotten them spayed because it's never been a good time (I have either the spare money or the time off to take care of them, never both) and they're 100% indoor anyway so at least no kittens. I've been planning to get them done this coming Christmas break, when I expect to have the money and the time to supervise their recovery, although I may end up getting at least Panther done sooner if I can since she has the most trouble with it. She always has gone into heat more often than her sister and for longer, and more loudly, but she's really suffering lately because my fixed male that didn't know he was fixed (therefore could and would, without risk of kittens, "calm her down") crossed the Bridge a few months back. I'd rather get both done at once, though, so that they'll be completely out of it at the same time instead of having the one that's not recovering not know any better and play too rough.

About the pain meds, I would be curious about what they mean by homeopathic since, if you get right down to it, really traditional homeopathic medicine is by definition at least 99.99999999% water. That's fine for some things, like dehydration, but cats don't know it's supposed to make pain go away, so the placebo effect wouldn't kick in. On the other hand, if they say homeopathic when they mean it comes from an herb and there's enough of it in the mixture to be useful, aspirin came from willow bark so if they've tested it and know it works I'd go for it.

If you need to save money on the pain meds, they can probably do without it if there are no complications as they'll still be loopy while they start healing, and you can give them a big bowl of traditional homeopathic medicine from your kitchen faucet.

Originally Posted by ebrillblaiddes

The vet may charge extra if she's still in heat at the time of the surgery (not completely sure why, I guess it's more complicated with things going on in the female parts region), but they can still spay her that way.

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The tissues associated with her reproductive organs are swollen while in heat, and it makes it more difficult to do the surgery at that time.

One vet told me (because I wanted my rabbit spayed and she was in "heat" at the time) that he considers it no big deal to spay cats and rabbits in heat, but he hates to spay a dog in heat. My regular vet (who doesn't do rabbits) prefers to wait until a cat or dog is out of heat, but will spay a cat in heat if it's necessary. But not a dog. They are more likely to bleed when they're in heat, and the whole process is just a bit more complicated. But I'm sure a low-cost program will spay a cat in heat and won't charge extra.

Perssonally, I've never used pain meds for spays/neuters (besides the 24-hour pain shot they give them during surgery) , but there was one older female that was in a lot of pain and I really wished I had gotten some longer-lasting pain meds for her. So for your female, since she's not a kitten anymore, I would probably ask for longer-lasting pain meds. The male shouldn't need them---he's young and neuters aren't as serious as spays. I've never heard of homeopathic pain meds....maybe it's just a calming type thing? I would go for the actual drug if possible.