Great News for spayed and neutered pets! We have an exciting new product available that addresses the often-seen issues that arise with spayed and neutered pets!
Issues that can arise after spaying or neutering include, but are not limited to, increased appetite and subsequent obesity, allergies, anxieties or aggressive behaviours, urinary incontinence, torn knee ligaments, and worst of all, early 4 to 7 year old aggressive cancers such as bone cancer, lymphoma and splenic tumours in certain breeds, mainly large breeds.
For about 15 years now, we have recommended and done hundreds of hormone-sparing sterilizations - the girls keep their ovaries but have a hysterectomy and the boys get a vasectomy - and this has worked out really well. This isn't to imply that dogs that are not fixed also don't get chunky, or don't get allergies, or don't tear their ACL etc. But we lessen the chance by a large margin if they keep their hormones.
Most pets are spayed and neutered as it makes life more manageable for the vast majority of owners, but it isn't necessarily the best thing medically as a hormone imbalance ensues. What happens is that a hormone produced in the pituitary, called Luteinizing Hormone (LH for short) that is responsible for gonadal development and ongoing "maintenance" no longer has anything to "turn it off" from being produced and it goes up and stays up at 30 times or more over normal levels. It is likely responsible for a lot of the above-named issues that we see as veterinarians, but obviously not all.
To try and help these spayed and neutered pets if they do indeed seem to be suffering issues related to excess LH, we awesomely now have an implant available in Canada as of last Aug 2023 that brings down the LH to more normal basal levels. It lasts on average about 6 months. It has no significant side effects that we have noted. My own Lacey, the American Bully, was a much happier dog within a week of her first implant on Sept 7 2023, and also of note is that her allergies for which I use Cytopoint, are about 30-40% improved. To me, that is well worth it and I am likely helping her on other levels too with hormone rebalancing.
We've had another client say about their Shepherd X that she is way happier and relaxed. She said she wants to play more and has more energy but the energy is more stable and not crazy/OCD.
The implant is not estrogen or testosterone by the way. It is GnRH, aka gonadotropin releasing hormone, and it signals to the pituitary to minimize LH production. At this point, we have done about 40 implants since last Fall. No anesthesia needed, just a poke and go!