Spay Neuter Clinic Experience

[smm482]

Does anyone have any experience working or volunteering at a low cost spay/neuter clinic? I am wondering what the pros and cons are of working at this type of clinic. My thoughts are that it would be rewarding to know you are helping so many animals and their owners, but that it could perhaps get redundant since the main purpose of the clinic is to spay and neuter large numbers of animals each day. Is it less rewarding to only handle/treat an animal once and send it on its merry way knowing you probably won't interact with it again (as you would at a traditional small animal clinic with a regular client)? I do think it could be a great opportunity to get lots of experience prepping animals for surgery. These are just my thoughts/assumptions though as I have no personal experience with S/N clinics. Any input you guys have would be greatly appreciated!

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[JustCats]

I work at feral cat s/n clinics and I love doing that. I also trap the cats and return them to their colonies after they're neutered, so I'm not sure if part of my satisfaction comes from the fact that I see them all the way through the process. Enough people volunteer month after month that I assume most find it to be rewarding. Give it a try once and see what you think. They won't hunt you down if you decide not to return. Probably.

Does anyone have any experience working or volunteering at a low cost spay/neuter clinic? I am wondering what the pros and cons are of working at this type of clinic. My thoughts are that it would be rewarding to know you are helping so many animals and their owners, but that it could perhaps get redundant since the main purpose of the clinic is to spay and neuter large numbers of animals each day. Is it less rewarding to only handle/treat an animal once and send it on its merry way knowing you probably won't interact with it again (as you would at a traditional small animal clinic with a regular client)? I do think it could be a great opportunity to get lots of experience prepping animals for surgery. These are just my thoughts/assumptions though as I have no personal experience with S/N clinics. Any input you guys have would be greatly appreciated!

 

[david594]

Definitely rewarding.

Its one of the best things you can do for a pet, and for many of the people utilizing it wouldn't otherwise get their animal fixed.

And spending a day shaving testicles or tipping ears is actually way more fun than it sounds like.

 

[CatVet2Be]

I've worked at S/N clinics for the last 5 years and it's one of the most rewarding things I've done. It's true that you don't get to see the animals after they leave and it's not a good place to work on client relationships because you have minimal if any contact with the owners. You'll also see a lot of very neglected animals who will likely never see a vet again. But you do get great surgical prep and monitoring experience and the ability to make these animals lives a little better one at a time. There's also the satisfaction of knowing you're proactively doing something to help stop overpopulation. The hours fly by because you're constantly busy and you get a lot of experience at restraining difficult animals.

 

[gone2dogs]

I volunteer at one and have found it to be a great experience! You definitely miss the client aspects of a regular clinic (which is why I volunteer at one of those too), but at least in my experience I get way more hands on experience. They are always in need of more help than they have, so by default I was trained very early on how to do things like give vaccines, prep animals, intubate, draw blood, give IV and IM injections, monitor anesthesia, administer fluids, etc. This low cost clinic also does dentals, so I have been learning how to scale teeth recently. I also do lots of monitoring recovering animals, cleaning packs, and other less exciting stuff. But when compared to the regular hospital where I might restrain an animal once in a while, I am getting loads more technical experience. I also get to interact much more closely with the vet, as the clinic is small and everything (for better or worse) happens in one room.

So your experience may vary, but for me it has been a great opportunity given I had no vet tech experience as recently as a year ago. And as others have said, it feels great to be helping out these animals!

 

[sumstorm]

I shadowed at one, and have some mixed feelings. I actually think it is an amazing way to learn about efficiency, as most S/N clinics need to deal with high volume and quick turn around between patients.

However, the one I observed at was a low cost clinic for a reason, and I had some real concerns about methods and techniques that other vets, when I talked about the procedures with them, called 'ancient' and 'risky.'

I also know that there were several deaths (not on the table, later, after return to owners) over the year that I shadowed (I only shadowed a few times a month.)

So the quality of the clinic may be important. I will say that the vets were wonderful, honest, funny, and knew there were greater risks to the patient, but felt that in an area with such a huge overpopulation, high unemployment rates (before the economy started slipping, even worse now) and a generally low standard of care for animals, the pros outweighed the risks.

 

[smm482]

Thanks for all of your feedback guys! I'm actually applying for a full-time position at a S/N clinic, but even if I don't get the job I will definitely spend some time volunteering there. Sounds like it could be very rewarding.

 

[bunnity]

I interned at a shelter that ran a low-cost general clinic, and did high volume outpatient s/n as well as all the shelter's animals. I loved it but can see why it wouldn't be for everyone. A couple pros and cons:

pros
- knowing you're doing a lot of good. This is easy to see in the shelter when you're faced with the result of overpopulation every day.
-if you love surgery-related stuff (like me) then it's an interesting and exciting way to spend most of the day.
-if you're trying to gain experience it's a great way to get comfortable with surgery / blood and to learn a lot of techniques for prepping - like someone said such programs are often reliant on volunteers.
-you will probably get to see other methods of neuter than you will learn in school.

cons
-there are certain things you won't learn about surgery that you would learn in a regular practice or an ER - we didn't intubate or do any intra-operative monitoring, and we didn't use pain meds. So those are techniques you won't learn, and also are probably less than ideal for the animals. That said, in an entire summer of watching surgeries (ie 100s to 1000s) I only saw one animal die on the table (not owned, and because someone had fed it and it vomited while going under and aspirated). I certainly felt like the high volume / low cost system was very worth it and helped the most animals the best we could. Others would probably disagree with some of the methods (like scrotal neuter vs. pre-scrotal neuter) but I personally didn't have ethical issues with anything that went on there.

 

[BrumleyVet]

Definately take the job at a S/N Clinic! I started at one, and yes it's true you do the same things every day, but you get to perfect your skills that way. There are sometimes emergencies, and really weird cases, so make sure you get to know the vets so they will let you get involved with those. You will see a wide range of clients - from low income people who still want the best for their pets, to the hoarders who want you to do 4 animals for the price of one! I even had a guy bring in his dog to be spayed when she was about due to deliver her litter! You will get first hand experience in patience, tolerance, and volume, and it will really put things in prespective.

 

[bunnity]

I even had a guy bring in his dog to be spayed when she was about due to deliver her litter!

Yep, be prepared for the possibility of seeing some spays on pregnant cats.

 

[aspiringDVM]

Yep, be prepared for the possibility of seeing some spays on pregnant cats.

If the appropriate authorities (ie vets and owners) will let you and you have formaldehyde on hand, preserve the uterus full of kittens and dissect it later on. It's really cool to see how everything is actually set up and connected!

 

[JustCats]

Statistically speaking, almost half of the females will be pregnant if you work a clinic in the spring. If you object to that you should ask for the clinic's policy before you volunteer. At our clinic we perform the spay and abort the fetuses no matter how late term the cat appears to be.

Yep, be prepared for the possibility of seeing some spays on pregnant cats.

 

[david594]

Yeah, you definitely keep the FP or euthasol on hand for the very late pregnancies.

One really cool case you could see is cats with only a single uterine horn. Its presumable a development thing because they tend to be missing a kidney on the same side. The kicker though is that they do usually have an ovary on that side, so the doctor will have to do some searching to find it.

It kills me because I forget what side its on, because all the ones the shelter I am at have come across have been on the same side.

 

[smm482]

If the appropriate authorities (ie vets and owners) will let you and you have formaldehyde on hand, preserve the uterus full of kittens and dissect it later on. It's really cool to see how everything is actually set up and connected!

They actually asked me during my interview today if I would take issue with spaying pregnant females or if it would be something I could deal with because it would be inevitable. I'm relieved to see I'm not the only one who thinks it would be cool/interesting to see! Obviously it's not ideal, but I would think it would provide an amazing learning experience. Then again, I witnessed my first castration on a horse a few weeks ago and promptly dissected the testicles the second they walked the yearling back up into the barn

 

[bunnity]

Yeah the pregnant spays freaked me out a lot less than I thought they would. It was more interesting than anything. We would use FP on anything but very small fetuses to make sure it was humane as possible for them. I asked the vet doing the spays how she felt about it, and she said that it made her a little sad but there are way too many homeless cats in the world and the shelter is already in over its head with all the ones that are already born, and this was the best thing for the cat population in general. She did get pretty mad at one of the newer techs that was excited about the procedure to the point of being disrespectful about it though, so I guess keep that in mind if you're the one observing - that it might be a little hard for the vet since they're the one actually doing the procedure.

 

[smm482]

I think that's a very good thing to keep in mind since it is such a touchie issue and people's opinions cover the whole spectrum.

 

[aspiringDVM]

What is FP?
The only pregnant spays I've seen have been quite early, only a week or two into gestation when the vet couldn't tell the cats were pregnant. The embryos I dissected were only about the size of my pinky nail.
However, I can definitely see how aborting older fetuses could be really difficult.

 

[david594]

FP= Fatal Plus.

For the very late pregnancies. It can be a little weird if the doc hands you the uterus and you can see the kittens moving.

 

[CatVet2Be]

I hate those. The worst was when I had to inject the euth solution IC into a late term puppy fetus and I felt it move in my hand when the needle went in. But it was that or watch them move in the uterus until they died from lack of oxygen. On the bright side I've gotten really good at palpating cat abdomens and guessing the number of fetuses and how far along they are. Odd things to be good at but in this field odd skills come in handy.