Prophylactic Gastropexy - Page 1

Does anyone have an opinion on prophylactic gastropexy?  Do you know of success rates, disadvantages, etc?  We are considering this for our 5 year old girl, whom will be spayed early March.  Our vet told us to research it and determine if this is what we want to do.  If it weren't for her already being spayed, we would not consider it.  He said it will cost us around $250 (not including the spay). 

We almost lost our last GSD to bloat/gastric torsion.  she was 12 years old when it happned, and she miraculously pulled through and lived another year!  but that whole ordeal was a nightmare and so we are considering it for our GSD that we have now as a preventative measure.  I don't know of any genetic history of this with her, and don't know if just "preventative measure" alone warrants doing the procedure.  Like I said, if it weren't for her being spayed, we wouldn't consider doing a surgery for that alone.  Thanks for any advice you can offer!

ps - on an unrelated note - I thought I'd share a couple things our vet told me .... he said that if you were to survey vets, GSD are the ones that they would least like to spay, as far as possible complications.  also, he said that Rotts & GSD puppies seem to be the most prone to parvo .... yikes!

Maybe you need to try another Vet?  The one mentioned sounds a little odd.

I too had an older GSD bloat, she was 12 at the time and we decided to try everything to save her. She lived another two years though at first I thought we made the wrong decision to have the surgery done, she had major complications from the surgery. She would vomit after eating, major issues with bowels and seemed just miserable. This lasted for 3/4 months. We finally got her on the right meds and made some changes with food/feeding and everything worked out fine.  I had our first GSD puppy at the time and I too freaked out and said to the vet about getting her tacked while spayed.  The vet was great he said he would do it but that there could be complications with the surgery some lasting for the life of the dog.  Personally I made the decision not to do the surgery, we are smarter when watching what they are eating, how much they are eating and never any type of exercise or excitement after eating.  We now have two excellent emergency vets in our area and have their numbers on hand just in case.  The vet we took our bloated girl too said he does 20 plus Bloat surgeries a week! And we are not in a very large area.  It does seem to be a major issue with larger dogs.

It is a very hard decision I'm sure you'll make the right one for you and your family.

Amy

Since she's being operated on anyway, the gastropexy is a reasonable thing to do *if* your vet does it properly. It will reduce the risk of bloat, and will prevent the stomach from twisting (torsion) if she does bloat.

I've had two dogs gastropexied, one because he had several episodes of near-bloat and the other because his flat, deep chest made him extremely high risk for bloat. The near-bloat dog did great and never had another episode of near bloat and never bloated. The other dog died from mesenteric torsion a month after surgery, despite heroic efforts to save him. It appears that he was doomed to torsion because of his anatomy and nothing could have prevented it.

Mesenteric torsion is a horror far worse than bloat--the intestines twist around, cutting off their blood supply, and die. It's very hard to diagnose (moral: when in doubt, operate!), and the dog is usually too far gone to save by the time the problem is diagnosed.

I had a rule in the house no cloths (socks especially) to be left out, I had seen too many dogs and cats for that matter with foreign body extractions due to this.  When the old dutch was spayed, I do not know why I did not have it done, so worried for years. To make a long story short, my daughter came home from college left socks down, dog ate three socks, a phone cord, and a penny for good measure. While we were in there extracting contents, we gastropexied.  If you are going to do this procedure do it when the dog is full grown.

There is a very good website that you can visit, the website of the American Academy of Veterinary Surgeons. They had a list of procedures & mortalities when I was using it to research the bowel plication that my girl had to reduce/eliminate the chance of intersusseption. She also has an exceptionally deep chest. Good luck! jh

missbeeb - not sure why you say to try another vet and that he sounds "odd" ...??  he has a ton of experience & knowledge.  we've given him our business for over 10 years and he always has the animals' best interest in mind.  since prophylactic gastropexy would be an elective surgery for our dog, he wants us to make sure that's what we want to do.  I am hoping I can find some people on here that have first-hand experience with having this done and could offer pro's & con's. 

Sorry- that's the American College of Veterinary Surgeons...very informative. Our girl is doing fine, but I worry all the time about foreign body ingestion. She is the worst dog ever for finding & picking up stuff she shouldn't have! jh

I was referring to your last paragraph. 

Years ago I had the procedure done on one of our females, a Malamute - she would eat anything in sight, including plants, twigs, and stones. (She was later diagnosed with Cushing's disease). After swallowing a rock that was too large to pass from her stomach (and looking like she was bloating as a result) I had the vet do the additional surgery at the same time he removed the rock...... I then never had to worry about possible torsion ever again, which was a great relief. There were never any adverse effects from the procedure....again, this was not a GSD, whether or not that makes a difference I can't say.

I suppose it comes down to where your comfort level is - if you feel that you are always going to be worried and on edge, wondering if history is going to repeat itself,  this may be the way to go for you.