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Spayed too early after litter?

Posted : 9/25/2006 1:50:28 PM

My rescued pointer Grace would dribble and leave small spots of urine here and there. I took her to the vet who found highly alkaline urine and struvite crystals with no bacteria to an infection. We changed her diet to lower PH, and he also gave her DES for urinary incontinence. She now takes 1 mg, twice a week. She is now fine without any dribbling or spots.

Before I got her she had had a recent litter of pups (noone knows what happen to her pups) and was spayed immediately at the shelter. She was in pretty bad shape and had a bad time, apparantly, recuperating from the spay. When I got her, her vulva and teats were still enlarged. She was not even yet 2 years old. Is it possible that she was spayed too early after she gave birth? Why would she have incontinence?

Should I try taking her off of the DES to see if her incontinence was caused by the urinary problems that she was having, or just continue to give her DES for the rest of her life?

diane303

Posted : 9/26/2006 4:22:04 PM

Well, guys - looks like everyone is stumped on this one.

I did get an answer from another source - justanswers.com - and this is it:
"Its not usually the timing on the spay that is the issue its how the individual dog reacts to the drop in hormones that come due to the spay.
You may find your dog will need replacement hormones or other meds to resolve the incontinence issue.
I've had dogs spayed during c-sections, after a litter, before a litter, as pups, and as adults and not had any incontinence issues. Others have seen issues no matter what the life stage was when their dog had the surgery.
A percentage of dogs when spayed have a problem. Sometimes this is due to a nerve being nicked during surgery, sometimes due to the hormone drop.
Hope this helps you!
The bladder crystals could have triggered the incontinence.
She may have been dumped because she had a problem all along with incontinence.
Muscle control could have been bad due to emaciation too.
You might, with your vet's guidance, if you can, now wean her off DES totally if she has recovered her health. You may or may not be able to do so depending on if the cause was the muscle wasting or the hormone need.
You could see how that went. If she needs the DES she might have needed it no matter when she was spayed.
Unfortunately there is no way of knowing.
Sounds like Grace is a lucky girl though to have found her new home with you!"

Any more input or comments? [8|]

cakana

Posted : 9/26/2006 5:06:17 PM

Why would she have incontinence?

Well I'm sure that other things could have caused or contributed to it, but I had a Samoyed I had spayed at 6 mos. and she developed spay incontinence. She was the first dog I'd ever had have that problem and we used DES for her entire life, with no problems. You could always try weaning her off the DES and see if the symptoms return. I don't see any harm in that but I'd check with the vet to make sure there aren't any problems from stopping and/or restarting it.

dvet

Posted : 9/26/2006 7:27:52 PM

it happens in humans also so they have to stay on hormones...but it won;t hurt to try to get back to the very lowest dose od DES that you can get by with..I had dogs that did fine on 1 mg every two weeks...try it, you can always gear it up again

diane303

Posted : 9/26/2006 9:48:05 PM

Thanks [

]. I think that I will try to spread her dosage out first to every 4 days and see what happens. She ha an appointment for her shots on the 13th. We'll talk to the vet about this at that time. She's such a good girl and it's good to see her doing so well!