Dr. Mike: Hello! I’m Dr. Mike. Today this VetVid up is on senior pet care.
We’re going to discuss why senior pet should be examine, what the
veterinarian maybe looking for and what test may be performed.
Dr. April Miles, a veterinarian in Rancho Santa Margarita
California is going to give us a brief introduction on this important
topic.
Dr. April Miles: Pet may be considered a senior about seven years on average if
you’re going to take all the breeds and sizes all together but small
breed dog do tend to age less quickly than giant breed dogs for
example. So if you’re looking a Great Dane I generally say about
six years of age is a senior, whereas a tiny dog maybe eight so
average seven years of age.
Senior exams are really important. I recommend them at least
every six months because they age so much faster than we do. We
can pick up subtle changes that an owner may not see. We listen to
the heart and lungs. We can hear murmurs, arrhythmias. We
palpate the abdomen, we can find masses. So yeah an owner may
find an ear infection or know that their dog has bad breath, but we
maybe able to pick up on diseases before the owner is aware of
them and help prolong the patience’s life potentially.
Specific questions that your veterinarian may ask you can keys into
various undergoing disease process is increase in water
consumption, increase in urination, change in defecation behavior
or eating like if your dog is eating a lot more, activity level, you
know, changes in breathing, exercising intolerance, stuff like that
can clue us into maybe an underlying disease process going on
with your animal.
Your veterinarian can also provide you with advice on special diets
for your senior pet specially certain breeds do have certain needs
as they get older, exercise that can be good for your pet especially
if they have certain diseases. During diseases stuff we can discuss
what exercise is appropriate if they have heart disease we could
discuss that with you. Your veterinarian may recommend blood
work or a senior wellness profile. These are sort of pre screening
things when we’re looking for maybe renal insufficiency, kidney
disease, liver disease just any sort of changes. We also like to
perform urinalysis as part of that senior wellness profile and a just
a fecal a basic screening to try and find diseases early before the
owners notice a change in their animal
Dr. Mike: Many veterinarians recommend that a senior pet be examined at
least twice a year. There are very important changes that take place
in a senior pet that may not be clinical. In other words, your pet
may not be showing any signs early on. However your veterinarian
is trained to pick up these real changes on a physical exam.
I recommend that your pet have routine blood and urine test
performed at each of these visits. Picking up a problem before your
senior pet is sick may make all the difference in their quality life.
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