when should you castrate or spay your cat or kitten are there any side effects to early
neutering or it is early age desexing the best thing you could do for your cat
hi I'm dr. Alex Avery from ourpetshealth.com helping you and your cat to
live a healthier happier life so if you want your cat to be as healthy as
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castrate and spay our cats for many different reasons
the big benefits to your cat and us as their owners are many and the first is a
reduction in fighting so cats are very territorial even more so and sexually
intact and this leads to increased fighting over resources be that land
food or mates so next is elimination of pyometra risk so pyometra is a
life-threatening infection of the uterus not many studies though have looked at
this in cats specifically and so we tend to consider it in the same way that we
do with dogs I mean I've done a thorough review of the emergency pyometra
up here and link down below so next is a reduced risk of HIV and FeLV so these
are viral diseases that have no treatment and results in an early death
of cats there are vaccinations available but
these are not 100% protection they are often spread by biting and the local
risk really does vary by region so if you can reduce fighting you can reduce
the risk of catching these fatal diseases reduced roaming is next and so
getting lost or injured on the road looking for a mate can take a cat a long
way from home the further they go a higher the risk of having an accident
becomes reduced to spraying and marking behavior is my next benefit to spaying
and castration entire cats are very territorial and will mark everywhere so
urine being sprayed in the house is unpleasant and scratching every surface
in sight can cause a lot of damage to your house and carpet
elimination of calling when a female is looking for a mate is next and this can
be very noisy and disrupting and if you don't know what to expect it actually
does cause a lot of emergency calls to the vet people worried that their pets
in a lot of pain and that's because they cry loudly they roll around on their
back on the ground and they can look very distressed so that's another big
benefit of getting your cat spayed and then a reduction in general stress is
the next spaying or castrating your cat so
constantly looking over your shoulder for competitors or feeling you need to
be continually marking your territory all the time is a stressful business
your cat will be a lot more relaxed if you eliminate these behaviors and so the
last big benefit of neutering your cat is a reduction in the number of kittens
looking for new homes if there is one thing that cats are good at and I
believe they're good at lots of things it is getting pregnant and producing
kittens so did you know that over half of cats admitted to animal shelters are
kittens now you might think that if your cat had kittens you'd easily be able to
find homes for them they're super cute everyone will want them but
unfortunately this is not always the case and it's not always that simple and
I know how hard it can be as we often end up having to rehome stray kittens at
the vet clinic and it can sometimes take a really long time to find them homes
even when they're incredibly cute well-behaved and friendly this shows in
the figures too with over 40% of kittens coming from owned cats so that's 40% of
all kittens in shelters are coming from unintentional breeding of pet cats whose
owners could not then find them a new home as much as I would like to say that
all of these cats then found forever homes the reality is sadly that around
30% of the shelter cats are euthanized and that is a huge proportion and a huge
number of cats so the traditional age for a cat spay or castration is five to
six months now this is fine if it actually gets done then and your cat
stays indoors until that point the age of sexual maturity though can be as
young as 4 months of age and this clearly leaves a window of opportunity
for your cat to get pregnant if they are female or to start competing and
fighting for the attention of any entire female in the neighborhood if your cat
is male why then not new to your cat earlier well early age neutering is
endorsed by many international organizations including the British
small animal Veterinary Association and Australia's Royal Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals the American Veterinary Medical Association
also currently recommends that cats not intended for breeding should be desexed
before 5 months of age ideally to reduce the euthanasia of healthy but unwanted
kittens though we would go a step further and castrate or spay all cats
before about 16 weeks of age that is before they become sexually mature but
what are the potential side effects of being spayed or castrated if you're a
cat and does the age at which this takes place actually make any difference well
concerns are often voiced by veterinary staff and they include increased
anesthetic risk the development of low blood glucose which can be very
dangerous and even fatal and finally orthopedic so that bony
problems so let's address these as well as some of the other problems that
people have suggested develop either after neutering in general or after
early age desexing now starting with anesthetic deaths in several studies
there is just no difference in death rate with those undergoing the procedure
from as early as seven weeks to those cats being neutered and anesthetized as
adults several different anesthetic techniques have also been looked at and
all that were studied were found to be safe so there is a risk with every
anaesthetic surgical procedure but in reality this risk is very low at around
0.1% and the age at which a cat is needed doesn't seem to
affect this risk in fact those cats neutered earlier actually seem to
develop fewer minor surgical complications let's look at orthopedic
or skeletal issues next so we know in dogs that if they are neutered too early
and they maybe it's an increased risk of developing joint problems it doesn't
appear cats are the same for a start they very seldom develop cruciate
ligament rupture and if they do it is generally because of a traumatic
incident they also rarely suffer from dysplasia or abnormal development of bed
joints something else that has been put forward is the fact that neutered
animals may be more likely to suffer from broken bones well the short answer
is that this is not true in the studies that have looked into this it does seem
that the growth plates stay open for longer in cats that are neutered but
there is no evidence that this then caught has any health problems next
let's consider urinary tract disease and again quite simply that doesn't appear
to be any association certainly a male cats castrated earlier or later older
cats and those that are fat are at a higher
risk with castrated males living longer and tended to be more overweight and so
that's why I maybe castrated males and more over-represented but age at
castration doesn't appear to role in this finally does early age
desexing affect a cat's behavior well again no in one study those needed
earlier had increased hiding behavior but this wasn't found in a separate
study and in both there was no difference in spraying fearful behavior
or in aggression so the bottom line is that it appears there are many benefits
of being spayed or castrated as a cat but very few downsides of being neutered
perhaps the only one being the risk of surgery itself as for when you should
new to your cats well I think it should definitely be done by six months of age
and if your vet prefers to carry out the operation when your cat is 3 or 4 months
old and that's absolutely fine there doesn't appear to be any increase in
risk at this age they may actually experience fewer complications and your
cat will be guaranteed not to be contributing to the global population of
unwanted kittens as always with anything like this you should discuss all of your
options with your vet there may be other health considerations to consider before
deciding on the best course of action for your particular cat and with any
surgical procedure surgeon experience and preference is a major consideration
so I hope this clears up the best age to neuter your cat or eases any concerns
about the side effects of neutering that you might have but what are your
thoughts please leave me a comment down below I'd really love to read them also
remember to subscribe for more videos end optimizing the health of your cat
and until next time i'm dr. alex from our pets health because they're family