How to Fix Your Dog or Cat

Let's talk about spay and neuter of your dog and cat. Spay and neuter is very very important for many reasons. One it prevents reproduction. We have lots and lots of stray cats and dogs in the United States and it is very difficult to keep up with them. There are thousands and thousands of dogs and cats that get euthanized every week due to just over population so spay and neuter prevents that so that is the number one benefit.

Number two is medically. Dogs male dogs as they get older can have prostate problems and lots of male dogs have behavioral issues as in roaming aggression, territorial aggression things like that, so neutering is of utmost importance for them for those reasons. Cats as far as males are concerned it is better for them because they tend to spray and have a real foul urine and can reproduce obviously. As far as females are concerned female dogs tend to have a very high incidence of mammary carcinomas or breast cancer and as they get older that can be a major incidence of problem.


They have a much higher incidence if they've even gone through one heat cycle so that's very important for them. Breast cancer is very difficult to manage especially in an older pet and they can actually die from that so it is very important to do that. Also females can get uterus infections as they get older after they have had heat cycles and that can also be life threatening so that's another reason to spay your female dog and/or cat.

How to Perform the Heimlich Maneuver on a Cat or Small Dog

Let's talk about the Heimlich maneuver in dogs and cats. The Heimlich maneuver we think about in people all the time, getting choked on a piece of food at a restaurant and something like that. In veterinary medicine it is not something that we use routinely, however, it does come to play in the home setting on rare occasions. Dogs and cats can get choked on items, can get choked on pieces of food and things like that.

The first thing you need to do is recognize are they actually choking on something or are they trying to gag or vomit. The way you know is typically if an animal is choking on something they are going to be opening their mouths, they're going to be retching over, they're going to be pawing at their face. So it is very difficult and you can get injured if you look in the mouth but that is the first thing to do is if you can look in there, look at the tongue and gum color and make sure it is nice and pink and not blue.


If we do think that there is absolutely a choking mechanism happening that there is something lodged in the back of the throat then we might pull out the Heimlich maneuver and the way you do that is basically is take your hands and ball them up and or one method is to ball one fist up with your palm over the other one, right below, or actually right in the upper abdomen and below the sternum and then use a quick just kind of gentle but firm upper motion to try to dislodge that. The next recommendation is to get your animal to a veterinary clinic as quickly as possible. It may not always be a choking situation or it may be something that you can't do on your own.

How to Get Rid of Cat Odor

Let's talk about how to get rid of cat odor. Cat odor comes from two sources, one urine odor and two, fecal odor. Litter boxes are very important to keep clean. There are many types of litter that are on the market, some work better than others, some cats rely on better than others.

Some cats don't like certain types of litter so always experiment initially to find out what your cat prefers. There are also many products on the market to help with urine odors, urine staining and things like that. Also some cats that are long haired may retain a little bit of urine or fecal material on their fur so keeping their fur under their tail trimmed or clean, baby wipes work very well for instance, can help urine and fecal odor.

How to Detect Skin Cancer in Cats

Let's talk about detecting skin cancer in your cat. Skin cancer is actually fairly common in cats. It almost exclusively shows up as being a raised plaque or a raised lump somewhere on the skin. In cats, especially, they are prone to getting skin cancer on the face - especially the nose and on the ears. The reason that is especially for outdoor cats is that they're getting sun damaged chronically, just like we think about with us.

Cats that are white color or tan color cats or have pink noses are much more susceptible to getting sun damage and sun damage can chronically lead to skin cancer. So the most common skin cancer we see is squamous cell carcinoma just like it is in people. It will show up as a lump or a bump and so if you see anything like that and you're concerned, then obviously get your veterinarian to check that and see if that is some sort of cancer or problem that they need to investigate further.

Tips on Emergency Dog Health Care

Hi I'm Dr. Adrienne Mulligan of Camp Verde Veterinary Clinic in Arizona and I'm here today to talk to you about doggy emergency care on behalf of expertvillage.com. There will always come a time in your life with your dog where you are going to need to know how to do something to put off veterinarian care at lease long enough to get there or until the veterinarian opens there doors the next day. So I'm here to talk to you a little bit about things you could safely do at home with your dog generally on the way to the vet or at least you could get a phone call into the vet.

There are several situations where this might apply and it could be in situations of were a dog might of have swallowed something they shouldn't or were they might of consume something toxic or where they might have broken something simple like a toenail or potentially even broken something more series as in a car accident or getting hit by a car. There are things you could to do to safely transport them to the veterinarian or to stop bleeding or steam the tie a little bit until you do have some expert care. Do realize in all these things that we talk about that you are going to want to see expert care it is the most important that you get them to the veterinarian as soon as possible.

How to Treat Cat Acne- Cat Health Care Tips

Let's talk a little about feline acne. Feline acne is very common in cats. It involved the chin. They can get lots of pustules, lots of inflammation and infection on the lower part of the chin and it's kind of poorly understood. It's mostly thought to be an immunologic type of response to something or nothing. We commonly recommend non-plastic bowls to eat out of, just so there is not any type of external stimulation to keep feline acne going. It can kind of sometimes come and go, despite therapy and it can be long and chronic and quite frustrating. Talk with your veterinarian if you think your cat has feline acne.

It looks like black discharge on the chin, and also red pustules that can be very irritated and these cats don't like you messing with them a hole lot. Sometimes we use benzyl peroxide pads to clean these chins out from time to time on a weekly or daily basis. Also topical medications can help reduce that inflammation over time. Basically a lot of these cats are going to resolve feline acne potentially on their own and again it may come back and become chronic. Feline acne would appear as being black discharge and crusting discharge on the lower part of the chin and also very commonly red swollen pustules and it generally obvious on cats that have feline acne to talk to your veterinarian clinic about treating and managing that disease.

How to Safely Trim Long-Hair Cats

Let's talk about safely trimming a cat's hair that has long hair and a cat such as this that has very long hair they commonly get matted and mat very easily because they can't get back to their hind end a lot of times and groom themselves and so you want to be very very careful when you are ever trying to trim long hair. So prevention is good. If you can trim some of that long hair off, getting matted is going to be a lot harder to occur obviously and so you never want to use scissors.

You want to either talk to a groomer or your veterinary clinic and they can obviously help you and guide you along that route as well but scissors you are always going to get into trouble with that. Cats have very thin skin and it is hard to see that skin underneath that long hair and so you can actually lacerate that long hair with scissors. There are some commercial products such as clippers both electric and cordless ones that you can actually use to trim that hair as well and say also have some manual strippers that you can get mats and kind of little knotted things out as well in long hair. So prevention is the key to prevent mats and always just be careful because that skin is very very easy to damage.