Surgical Care for Your Feline Friend

UCVC cat veterinarians provide the following surgical services:

• Spays and neuters
• Biopsies
• Mass removals
• Wound debridement
• Laceration repair
• Exploratory surgery (GI foreign bodies, intestinal biopsies, etc)
• Bladder stone removal
• Amputation of irrevocably damaged or diseased tails
• And more!

Speciality Surgery

We offer a long list of specialty surgeries, performed by a board-certified surgeon who brings in his own team. Using this resource, we can provide access to many procedures that would otherwise require referral to a specialty hospital.

When Your Cat Needs Surgery

Regardless of the reason, it is always stressful when your cat needs surgery. Surgery is often a necessary choice for a patient, whether elective (spaying, neutering) or otherwise (intestinal foreign body removal, bladder stone removal, etc.). As a cat parent, you need to know that there is always some level of risk associated with surgery (anesthetic problems, surgical complications, recovery complications), and there is always discomfort associated with any surgical intervention.

At UCVC, we want to make the surgical experience as stress-free and painless as possible for you and your kitty. We employ a multi-step process to accomplish this:

1. We identify and mitigate risk factors, as part of a pre-surgical evaluation.
2. Next, we make the experience as low-stress as possible for you. This includes making sure you are fully informed about all your options before moving forward, and that all your questions are answered in advance.
3. We want to make the surgical experience minimally stressful for your cat. This is accomplished with a peaceful, quiet environment, comfortable housing, premedication for anxiety when necessary, gentle handling, and anything else your cat may need.
4. Our next goal is to minimize painful stimuli by using minimally invasive surgical techniques, and to manage pain effectively where it cannot be avoided.
5. During recovery we have a dedicated team member stay with your kitty until he/she is fully awake.
6. Finally, we want your kitty's recovery to go smoothly at home, and in the unlikely event that problems do arise, we will provide you with home care information, and make sure you know how to recognize them and what to do about them.

Preparation for Surgery

• Please do not feed your kitty after 8 p.m. the night before surgery, unless otherwise directed.
• It is okay for your cat to drink water right up until you leave home, unless otherwise directed.
• We want to be sure that all your questions about the procedure have been answered. If you have questions or concerns, please contact us.

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Surgical and Dental Suites: Where Surgery Happens

Surgery at UCVC is performed in our sterile Surgical Suite under sterile conditions. Our veterinary surgeons will don caps and masks, scrub for surgery, and then put on gloves and gowns before entering the suite. The surgical instruments will have been thoroughly cleaned and sterilized prior to use. Sterile technique is utilized to maintain the sterile surgical field.

Some surgical procedures require cleanliness but not sterility. These include dental procedures, debridement of infected tissues, and other such procedures where contamination is inherently already present. These "clean" procedures are usually performed in our Dental Suite.

Both the Surgical and Dental Suites are thoroughly cleaned and decontaminated after every procedure.