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Clinics in Dongola, Makanda offer laparoscopic surgery for pets

BY LINDA RUSH, THE SOUTHERN

Tuesday, July 15, 2008 10:18 AM CDT

DONGOLA - Simply put, it's a kinder cut.

Dog owners in Southern Illinois now can have their pets spayed using laparoscopic surgery, a technique that reduces recovery time to two hours or less.

Veterinarian Tony Ulrich of the Ulrich Veterinary Clinic in Dongola and Stone Creek Veterinary Clinic in Makanda said the Dongola clinic has performed 50 of the laparoscopic spays since April, and he's convinced laparoscopy is "a superior procedure" for his canine patients.

"It's amazing how well they do, how quickly they recover and how little pain they're in," Ulrich said.

The clinic still performs traditional spays, but as word gets around, it's scheduling more and more of the laparoscopic surgeries, he said.

He said the Dongola clinic is the only veterinary clinic in the Heartland performing laparoscopic spays. "In fact, someone told me we're the only vets south of Interstate 80 doing them" in Illinois, he added, but he hasn't checked out that claim.

On Monday morning, Ulrich spent 42 minutes performing a laparoscopic spay on a 60-pound pit bull from a shelter in Marion. Less than two hours later, the dog was up and walking around, ready to go home.

"You'd never know she'd ever had surgery; they didn't even shave her hair," said Debbie Choate of the Marion Regional Humane Society, who is keeping the dog until sending it to a rescue group from the Chicago area. Without the surgery, she wouldn't have that chance for adoption, Choate added.

Instead of an incision two to three inches long and traditional stitches, the dog has three tiny (3/16-inch) slits, closed with glue or a single stitch. The only post-op restriction is "no swimming" until the little incisions heal, Ulrich said.

With laparoscopy, there's no need for another trip to the vet to have stitches removed. And, because the tiny camera that scans the abdominal cavity can detect any problems before the instruments are removed and the incisions are closed, the chance of post-op complications is minimal, Ulrich said.

A laparoscopic spay runs $35 to $40 more than a standard surgery; prices vary with the size of the dog. Older dogs may require more tests before undergoing anesthesia and surgery, which could increase the price slightly.

The laparoscopic spays are being done only at the Dongola clinic at present, but clients of the Stone Creek clinic can drop their dogs off there, and technicians will transport them to Dongola for surgery, then return them later in the day to Stone Creek.

The laparoscope also is used for biopsies and to suture the stomachs of large-breed dogs to the abdominal wall so the stomach doesn't rotate and cause bloating.

So far, Ulrich and his staff are performing laparoscopic spays only on dogs. The procedure is the same for cats; it simply requires different instruments to accommodate the smaller animals. The initial setup for dogs cost about $20,000, he said. The equipment manufacturer provided training through a Web site lab.

Though Ulrich had performed standard spays by the hundreds, he said he was at a slight disadvantage during the initial instruction on the laparoscope. A younger vet at the clinic, who had honed the needed hand-eye coordination by playing sophisticated video games, picked up the technique more quickly. Ulrich - who said his video-gaming was mostly limited to Pong - quickly overcame that barrier, though. Now he's totally comfortable manipulating the instruments while watching the surgery on a video screen.

During the surgery, a tiny video camera is inserted through one of the incisions, a cutter-cauterizing unit through another. An instrument is inserted into the third, slightly larger incision to move the tissue and remove the ovaries. That incision gets a single stitch; the others are glued.

Birdie Conant of Villa Ridge runs the Southern Illinois Pet Society, an animal rescue group. She said she's had about 25 dogs spayed at the Ulrich clinic with the new procedure.

"It's wonderful for the animals," she said. "They heal a lot faster and they don't have to go through the stress of surgery. It's a little more expensive, but the dog recovers real well. I would recommend it to anyone."

linda.rush@thesouthern.com

351-5079