Laboratory Evaluation Prior to Surgery

Surgery is a common part of veterinarian medicine. All surgery is associated with an anesthetic. Improvements in anesthetic have increased remarkably in the last 30 years, which has helped to decrease the anesthetic risk. However, the risk is still there. In human medicine, laboratory evaluation is not optional. In veterinary medicine, laboratory evaluation is still optional at this time. Our Doctors recommend laboratory evaluation on all patients for all surgical and laboratory evaluation.

Benefits of Laboratory Evaluation Prior to Surgery

• Many animals that appear normal have sub-clinical disease that markedly increases the risk of an anesthetic to your pet. It is better to cancel surgery and resolve the underlaying problem prior to surgery rathen than risk your pet's life.
• There are multiple options in the types and anesthetic protocols that may be used. Laboratory evaluation allows anesthetic protocols to be custom designed for each patient instead of trying to make one shoe fit all.
• Identify sub-clinical problems that may not increase your anesthetic risk and prevent surgery but should be resolved before developing clinical signs.

We feel laboratory evaluation is a win-win situation for you and your pet.

Disadvantage of laboratory evaluation

There are none except for a slight increase in cost of procedure.

Why is this not included in the cost of surgery?

In a perfect world pre-surgical lab work and advanced surgical monitoring would be included without any thought. Unfortunately, many veterinary surgical procedures are routinely priced shopped by consumers without any realization of what is really included or not included in a procedure. In order to assure people are comparing apples to apples, these procedures are not included in the surgical price but rather as separate optional procedures. Because these procedures are optional, from a standpoint of offering your pet the best care possible, we recommend these procedures for every surgical case. Although we will admit that we do preform surgeries without pre-anesthetic testing, we do not like to do this. When there are complications during surgery that could have been prevented by pre-anesthetic testing, there are no second chances. 

Disclaimer

Laboratory evaluation is recommended to reduce the risk factors of anesthetic to your pet. However, acceptance of laboratory testing is not a guarantee of eliminating all risk of anesthetic. There is always a risk anytime an anesthetic is used.