Desexing Older Males

[DAVERI]

Just after advice on desexing a male dog later in life. He was living on my inlaws farm. Last weekend for unknown reasons he and another dog were let out together and took off. We drove the streets all weekend, walked the almost 400 odd acres, posted ads online and contacted all the vets, RSPCA and local pound. The pound said they had NOT been picked up. First thing Monday morning we went to the pound to look for ourselves. Both dogs had been there since Saturday but had been listed as two totally wrong breeds. The male is a large kelpie cross and the other dog was a pure bred kelpie. The larger dog listed as a mastiff and the pure kelpie listed as a pure cattle dog.

Cut a long story short the male had to be desexed before being released. He is 7 odd years old and had massive well developed testicles. When we collected him they has removed the testicles but has left the sac. We were told that the sac would fill with some fluid but would be smaller than what he had prior to the desexing and it was nothing to worry about. They said he was not in need of pain relief etc. but to keep him quiet.

He has come home to live with us. Kept him as quiet as possible, a walk each evening and inside. He is eating ok and drinking but he has been urinating while he walks, and while he poos.

He had his 4 day check-up today at the vet I use for our other animals. The vet was very unhappy with how his desexing had been done. He said for his age and the size of scrotum, his sac should have been removed. He is inflamed, and in pain. The vet did say we had been doing everything right to give him the best chance of recovering but the odds were against us due to the incorrect desexing. We had never been given the option to have his sac removed during the desexing. Honestly I was surprised it wasn’t, any male I’ve ever had done had always been removed.

He has 6 days of meds to bring down the swelling and should that not work he will have to go in to have the full sac removed which will be high risk and almost twice the cost of desexing due to the higher risks.

As you can imagine we are really upset. We hadn’t been given the option to remove his sac, had we been consulted we would have opted for it to be done. Apart from the problems he is having now I could only imagine it causing him further discomfort and possible injury later on as even swollen it hangs almost 3 ½ inches. Empty it’s going to hang longer. He is a high active dog having been a working dog on a property. The vet we seen today said in younger dogs, yes the sac would reduce greatly in size but he was so well developed and for so long he holds very little hope it will be much smaller than it is now.

I’d like to know other peoples experience on having older dogs desexed. Had they had the full sac removed or not and what their outcome was please. I’m also interested to know if this is a common practise for older dogs?

[Ruin Maniac]

If I were in your shoes, I would consider talking to the pound with a letter from the vet describing the injury to the dog that has been caused by the botched desexing. I don't believe in the mandatory desexing of all male, even crossbreed, dogs. There are risks involved (that most vets and animal welfare advocates won't care to share with you) and a responsible dog owner shouldn't be phased by having to take extra precautions - it's just that there are so many irresponsible dog owners, as we all know too well. I can understand why they would desex a wandering dog (and it's a shame they were let out), but there is no excuse for bad surgery.

[Ruin Maniac]

double post

Edited February 23, 2013 by Ruin Maniac

[*kirty*]

I have never heard of vets removing the sac. Normal desexing involves an incision being made above the testicles, testicles 'popped out' and removed, then incision sewn shut. Even in older dogs that were done, the sac is left intact. It will shrivel up eventually. My grandparents had to have their dog desexed late in life (I think he was about 10-11yrs) for health reasons and it shrivelled up after a while.

[Airedaler]

I had my boy done at about 7 the sac was not removed and it fairly quickly shrunk to being almost not there at all.

I believe the main reason the desexing is done this way is that if they were to remover the sac there would be a much larger wound. By leaving it they can just make an incision and pop out the testicles and healing is quicker and easier on the dog.

My boy's sac was swollen for a few days but reduced quickly. pain relief was given during recovery though. His recovery from the surgery was very quick, less than an hour after he was home he was doing what he always does. We did confine him for a day or so to keep him quieter.

[Dame Aussie]

Dogs don't normally have the sac removed when desexed and as Kirty said it normally shrivels up.

Poor boy, I hope it's all sorted soon.

[Her Majesty Dogmad]

Yes, normally the sac shrivels up. We've had adopters ask if we've desexed the dogs because they can see it still.

[poochmad]

We had our boy desexed at three and boy was he sore! We thought it would be a simple procedure as per a six month old pup, until the vet educated us. For quite a long time you could see the sac, although it was emptied, but now it's closer to his body and you can't even tell.

[Karrine]

Itoy was desexed at 2 years and his sac is still shrivelling 1 year later - Suerti was castrated at 10 months and his is still very obvious but shrivelling slightly :)

[angelsun]

I had a well endowed male desexed at that age..yes he got swollen...yes he shrunk up in time. I've never heard of a scrotum being removed unless there was damage through accident or tumour etc. I'd be questioning that vet to have made such a statement and to imply that the swelling was anything but normal post op condition. Wanting some money for another proceedure perhaps?

[Greytmate]

Removing the sack is called a scrotal ablation and is not routinely done. Not all vets will perform this because it involves more risk. It is common for there to be inflammation after castration especislly if the dog is active. Some vets recommend trestment for the inflammation, some don't.

[Greytmate]

The scrotum will always shrink a lot over time anyway, even in old dogs who had giant dangly balls.

Your vet was out of line saying that the odds were against you for recovery because of this. Your dog will recover. I would not subject this dog to a scrotal ablation, and I would avoid the daily walk while he is still swollen.

[Rebanne]

Why did the pound desex your dog? You weren't buying him, you were collecting him. (Paying whatever fees/fines you had to).

[persephone]

I also have never seen a scrotum removed in normal adult DOG /Cat male desexing ....it would be most unusual .

adult males do need to be totally rested ...as it is more of a shock to their sytem than a young pup.

Is the swelling clear fluid? Is there much bruising? (Did your vet consider a bleed ? I have seen haemophiliac dogs with scrotums the size of a baseball..in a hurry )

It will hang ..and normally, any 'vacuum' will fill with fluid .. this takes some time to resolve .

[Rappie]

Scrotal ablation is not routine in Australia. The only time I have had reason to perform it is when removing scrotal skin tumours where castration is also required. Not performing it is certainly not an 'error'. The scrotal swelling may be a normal post op occurence, or could perhaps reflect a scrotal haematoma if there were inadequate control of any bleeding either from the ligatures or even from skin oozing (older dog castrations may be quite messy this way). Unless it's infected, or getting significantly bigger over successive days it should resolve with time and the scrotal skin will shrink.

[OSoSwift]

Our male was done at 8 and he had massive testicles. The scrotum was not removed and over time it shrunk back to a little "fold of skin"

In over 15 years I have never seen the scrotum removed in any dog of any age where the castration was routine.

I also question why the dog was desexed prior to bring given back to you his owner. Rehomed to someone else yes I can understand, but not back to his owner.

Edited February 23, 2013 by OSoSwift

[Katdogs]

Yes, normally the sac shrivels up. We've had adopters ask if we've desexed the dogs because they can see it still.

I've been guilty of double-checking with vets about this

One of my rescues was a very healthy young boy, maybe a year old. His sac was bigger after desexing than before - for a couple of weeks, then it all settled.

I've also had a 14ish year old male desexed and within a month or so his sac had shrunk right back down.

[Dame Aussie]

Some councils require dogs to be desexed (it's mandatory) before they leave the pound.

[DAVERI]

its part of their way of cutting out unregistered breeding. council have exceptions to registering working dogs but if they get picked up the are still treated as unregistered dogs even tho they are not required to be registerd.

one dog was desexed etc the male was not. the inlaws had the female desex years ago but as they live on some 400acres surrounded by a further 1000 or so acres kms away from the nearest house he was not.

I had called the pound saturday which is when they had been picked up, yet they told me they had not been picked up. i gave a very detailed description of both dogs. but the ranger had listed both as breeds they look nothing like and the female was listed as not desexed when she is tattooed. im not sure how a ranger can mistaken a chocolate and tan purebred kelpie with a purebred cattle dog. had i been told they were there saturday i would have saved money and less stress on both dogs. when we found them on monday neither dog had been scanned for chips.

I should have been more clear we could have had him not desexed but the fees for release are so high i paid less for my car and 6mths rego. plus we had the second dog to also pay for impound fees on. and they do not offer payment plans and with only 3 days to claim them and 2 days already past leaving either dog there was never an option. tho it was never an option for us to leave the dogs i can see why some people don't claim their pets. as the fees are too high.

its still really not clear as to why they even took off. neither are young dogs and both well trained workers. they don't normally get out together cause they normally run down to the creek and roll in all things stinky like cow poo and dead roo etc. but something had up set them the night before and they had both been barking all night which was not like them. they also got picked up by the ranger with in an hour of running off miles away from home. i guess its possible they hitched a ride with someone and then some how got out of the car but yeah.

he has only had the meds once today but we see a decrease in swelling already. the swelling wasn't huge but just alittle smaller than how he looked before desexing. he is leaking a white liquied and as i said before is weeing while walking and weeing while pooing. the sight were the stitches are is red and very tender but clean and he has his cone on for 2 weeks.

the vet today just was not nice about the service the pound offer (and did not charge for today other than meds) and given the mix up we had with the breeds and other dog we were worried. when i had my other two males desexed they had sacs removed but it was also some 20 years ago.

[Rebanne]

Some councils require dogs to be desexed (it's mandatory) before they leave the pound.

Which councils require a dog to be desexed when being reclaimed by it's owner?