Patty, this would be excellent if it didn't have the personality altering effects that a traditional surgical approach has, and aside from that it would still be amazing simply due to how much easier it would be to do.

James Riley November 13th, 2008 10:00:00 AM

James: I don't subscribe to the belief that spays and neuters alter the basic personality of an animal. Though it commonly affects male behavior (especially true in the case of cats, whereby their prey, roam, sex and aggression drives are dramatically altered), I have a hard time believing that personality, per se, is affected. 

Certainly this depends on how we as humans perceive animal personality. But from my perspective the major changes are more a blunting of drives than the cataclysmic shift many owners fear.

Furthermore, I suspect that any sterilization drug, vaccine, whatever, would have these same effects if the upshot of their use is a change in hormonal status.

Dr. Patty Khuly November 13th, 2008 10:23:40 AM

Just out of curiosity, would this non-surgical speuter only prevent reproduction, or would it also prevent health issues prevented by speutering (i.e. pyometra, uterine/ovarian/testicular cancers, etc.)? 

I can see the benefits of this method (if it would be 100% sterilization) for TNR, and even for our pets if it would eliminate the health risks associated with the organs that are removed in the traditional speuter. 

Perhaps I'm being a little extreme in wondering if this pill/injection sterilization would carry all of the benefits of the surgical approach, and if it did, I'd be interested, but I *do* like the fact that not only are my cats unable to reproduce, but they won't be getting certain infections/cancers because those organs just aren't there.

Michigan Pet Lover November 13th, 2008 10:39:43 AM

Michigan Pet Lover: I'm sure that time would tell. The short answer is that we don't know yet. The goal is to spay and neuter as many pets as safely and effectively, as possible with the goal of pet overpopulation  in mind, but that doesnt mean that some hormones might not continue to predispose dogs to pyometras and mammary tumors. In this example, doing so might still require that owners spay their pets surgically. As with surgical spays and neuters, long term effects would only be determined...over the long term.

Dr. Patty Khuly November 13th, 2008 11:32:42 AM

To add to what Michigan Pet Lover spoke off - please remember that just because women take birth control or tubal ligation, they can still get all the cancers of the reproductive tract... There couldn't be all the benefits just from a shot or a pill - so for those animals (cats/deer/etc) that are 'managed' i.e. their life expectancy and cause of death aren't a personal issue, yeah a shot/pill is probably acceptable. However, for those creatures actually given a place in our homes, whose overall health issues we are individually concerned with, no, I just don't see it being a better plan.

Kate November 13th, 2008 11:35:06 AM

I'd like to mention a potential downside to this method: serious possibility for malicious harm. I would hate to see a bunch of animal rights extremists armed with (legally or illegally obtained) doses of this drug showing up at dog or cat shows and ruining a bunch of valuable breeding stock. Breeds could be pushed toward greater genetic problems and/or extinction with indiscriminate use of such a product. I see the great potential for good in dealing with unwanted populations, but the unintended consequences potential is at least as great, if not greater, for those who are trying to preserve a specific subpopulation of animals.

kabbage November 13th, 2008 12:00:48 PM

kabbage: Where do you get your brain? ;-) Leave it to you to come up with the doomesday scenario. LOL.

Dr. Patty Khuly November 13th, 2008 12:02:55 PM

I think it would be AWESOME for strays and feral populations - not only cats and dogs but (while we're dreaming) it would also be great for deer populations in urban areas where hunting (or the introduction of large natural predators) just isn't safe. Depending on the side effects, it could also make it easier for responsible breeders to make sure that pet quality puppies aren't bred. It also would hopefully be a much less expensive alternative for shelters and rescues - and would make free mobile pet sterilization services much more feasable for poor neighborhoods. But I agree with others here, that most pet owners will probably still opt for the surgical route. I would imagine that if you adopted a pet who had been chemically sterilized then you could still have it surgically speutered at your convenience.

Barb November 13th, 2008 12:05:32 PM

I can't begin to contemplate how this would work without serious side effects. What type of process would occur to have a permanent "shut down" of the reproductive organs, that would not have consequences for the rest of the organs and support systems (i.e. the endocrine system). I know what I had a thyroid tumor, I was given 2 options: drink a cup radioactive iodine that would kill my thyroid and tumor and be "reabsorbed" by my body (with long term radioactive side effects) -OR- surgery. I opted for surgery, thank you! And I have (most of) my thyroid still. I know many people are frightened and averse to surgery. It's understandable, but the larger consequences of something like this frightens me, both for the health of our pets and for the broader-reaching ideas that kabbage mentioned. It's just too unclear a concept for me to be excited about it.

Creature of Habit November 13th, 2008 12:35:17 PM

Not a fan of pills, until someone shows me that they don't contribute to environmental hormone pollution. But the injection sounds ideal for shelters and TNR! kabbage: breeders who are preserving and improving breeds deserve exponentially more respect and support than they typically get. Especially dogs, because so much effort and care already went into those breeds, and especially cats, because so many subpopulations are not recognized as breeds and could easily (in the absence of pet overpopulation) vanish as lousy  breeders stuck in the British colonial period minimize the gene pools of the pure breeds. Our hope is that breeders WOULD get that respect, once overpopulation stopped making every pet a dime a dozen. Meanwhile, I guess we shold put some faith in security.

Sarah November 13th, 2008 12:57:25 PM

Dr. K -- the "Contact Us" link on the new 2.0 site is broken,  or I would be sending this message there. Feel free to delete it from the comments once you have read it. For some reason I'm getting the RSS feed of the site over and over. I mark all of the stories read, and they show up again an hour later unread. I think this is the fifth time it's happened today, so you might want to contact whoever's running your back end system and let them know there's an issue. I enjoy reading Doolittler -- and I usually come over to read the comments, which reflects in your page views -- but I can't take having 15 "new" articles hitting my RSS reader every hour.

Feline November 13th, 2008 01:07:28 PM

Feline: I had a few glitches with the RSS feed while I was putting it together. That shouldn't be happening any more. I have it subscribed in my RSS reader and am having no problems at this point. You might want to delete the feed and resubscribe to see if the issue goes away. The contact us link will be fixed shortly, thanks for bringing it to my attention.

James Riley November 13th, 2008 01:26:24 PM

If an injection isn't available, then what the heck is this?     

http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?c=11+1997&aid=2912     

Or am I completely confused?

Deanna November 13th, 2008 09:31:12 PM

I'm more doomsday than kabbage...I fear the type of animal experimentation that will go on in "search" of this magic pill or injection.

Barbara "Pocket's Story from NH" November 13th, 2008 09:46:30 PM

I think that the potential for harm is great here. As well as good. Too many unanswered questions for me, starting with why do 2 doctors wish to fund this.....

????

LorriM November 13th, 2008 10:11:43 PM

LorriM -- eek! good question. Ha. That's kind of scary. (Honestly is neutering in particular that hard to do without injections, if you don't mind causing the animal some pain? I mean -- they've been gelding animals  (and people, till more recently, I suppose I should acknowledge) reasonably reliably for thousands of years. I have no idea whether all those animals were traumatized though, which would certainly not be desirable for pets, or, by my lights, domestic animals, and maybe ferals as well I don't know.) I guess the Neutersol doesn't reduce testosterone, so James Riley's cats could still act like toms, or whatever. In Riley's defense, don't hormone levels actually matter in sporting breeds (not talking about cats anymore)? Although I guess a lot of those, if they're competing, are (considered) breeding material anyway. If I were the one being asked to fund this research, I'd be thinking like Creature of Habit. But dang, who knows what they'll stumble on. I hope Barbara's fears aren't justified; that would be pretty twisted! though I guess likely.

Sarah November 13th, 2008 10:58:13 PM

Deanna: A failed attempt, I'm afraid. That's a 2003 article in your link. Nope. Too many issues with that one.

LorriM: Both docs have organizations that fund shelter work. Much of their focus (once they each made their gazillions) has been animal welfare. (At least that's my understanding.) Check out the Wall Street Journal article I reference in the post.

Sarah: You're right about sporting breeds and testosterone. But I attribute it to drive, not personality. At home, you would expect a neutered and unneutered version of the same dog to have much the same personality (goofiness, aloofness, cuddle factor, etc). But, again, it's not that I think James is wrong, I just think it depends on how you define pet personality.

Dr. Patty Khuly November 14th, 2008 08:17:40 AM

FIV was an issue for our local feral colony (before it was decimated by an influx of coyotes and fishers). Of the three males we managed to trap beforehand, two were positive (one was terminally ill and had to be euthanized, the second was otherwise doing well, and I kept him). The third was just reaching sexual maturity when we trapped him.. that's probably the only reason he didn't have it. I'm sure it was everywhere- both feral and owned toms living in the neighborhood (there was an irresponsible neighbor living nearby- hence all the ferals) were observed *covered* in bite wound abscesses on a regular basis.

For this reason (possibility of infection and/or disease transmission via bite wounds), I would not want to use non-surgical means for sterilization if the testosterone levels weren't reduced by the product. Although such intervention might cheaply halt the proliferation of the colony, it would do little to improve the existence of those already living within it.

Ramen Connoisseur November 14th, 2008 09:58:19 AM

I'm amazed that you think my scenario is so "doomesday" (sic), Dr. K. People have turned other people's dogs loose at shows before for malicious purposes. Sarah, one can say people should watch their dogs and trust security, but if one person has 2 dogs at an event, at some point one dog will be left behind while the other competes. Even if the crate is locked, the dog's need for air means there are big enough holes to get small pieces of food into the dog.

And even if you are not worried about a breed as a whole (and please think carefully about rarer breeds like Flatcoats where the breeding population is pretty small to begin with), how do you think a breeder would feel if one of their best dogs, their hope for their kennel's future, was sterilized by someone else's choice?

Once developed, there is no way to keep these sterilization drugs from people who would use them to do harm. Vets who espouse animal rights rather than welfare, people who do not distinguish between responsible and irresponsible breeding.... They all have incentive to misuse these drugs.

Thank you to the others who realize there are such things as "unintended consequences."

kabbage November 14th, 2008 11:48:00 AM

kabbage: That must've come out wrong (my response to your commnt.) I certainly didn't mean to minimize your POV. I was actually just laughing to myself because it's the kind of thing I would never think about but which is clearly a huge risk for certain circles.

Dr. Patty Khuly November 14th, 2008 12:50:29 PM

Until a safe, proven non-surgical procedure can be used, why not spay females in a less drastic way, ovariectomy instead of the ovariohysterectomy? A few months ago, I took him my late french sister's dogs, and this is the way the female was spayed in Paris. Tiny side incision for laparascopic removal of ovaries, minor pain and recovery, no long term problems with the uterus either, I did read several studies. I asked my dogs' surgeon in the States why it was not practiced here, his answer was it requires more surgical skills than most vets have.

Dominique November 14th, 2008 04:45:49 PM

The thing about individual spay and neuter operations are that they directly benefit the individual animal concerned, and the owner. To develop a pill or another kind of "medical" sterilization, you'd have to have a colony of experimental animals who will not benefit from the procedure themselves, and may even suffer harm when they are administered prototypes that have adverse effects. How would these animals be kept, cared for and maintained once they are no longer useful for research? As they wouldn't benefit from the protection of individual owners who actually care about them, this is not exactly, to my mind, a very compassionate or thoughtful project.

brebis noire November 15th, 2008 07:21:44 AM

Dominique: I ovariectomize dogs on occasion. I prefer it. The reason I don't do more is because I've begun to worry about being sued for doing things so differently than is the accepted standard within my area.

In fact, that's why I now add external sutures to all my spays and neuters--an emergency vet told one of my clients that the internal suture method I'd used was not as strong as the traditional method and that's why it had been so easy for her to bite open her wound (not true, they're equally secure, but owners are more likely to not heed my requirements for an e-collar when the stitches are not visible).

Sometimes doing things differently, unless you're a specialist, has a way of blowing up in your face--even if it represents a higher standard of care.

Dr. Patty Khuly November 15th, 2008 10:54:51 AM

brebis noire: Agreed. But how to accomplish this otherwise? The entire history of medicine is fraught with these ethical challenges. Animal medicine and human pediatrics is especially problematic in this way. Utilitarian thinking sounds coarse when applied to animals but this is one area where the greater good can be served while mitigating the effects on the animals if proper care is taken. How to define "proper care"? The study's methodology must provide loving homes for the subjects, among other welfare concessions. I think it's a fair trade-off.

Dr. Patty Khuly November 15th, 2008 11:00:14 AM

Dr. Khuly, you're right about the whole history of medicine. I recently wrote a long paper on the history of antivivisectionism from the 1800s to the present, and the disturbing conclusion is of course that without the "sacrifice" of so many animals, many if not all of the medical advances we and our animals benefit from would not exist(but there are many advances we probably wish we hadn't occurred). Can't turn things back on that history, anyways - though we can change our own way of thinking and work for change, as you've suggested. But legally, as long as animals are considered to be property rather than persons, I'm doubtful that we'd have any kind of assurance the animals would be given proper care, under any reasonable definition. It would depend entirely on the attitude and commitment of the team of researchers, wouldn't it? I'm not even convinced the benefits of medical sterilisation could potentially outweigh the benefits of surgical sterilisation at any point. (I'm a vet, but I don't do surgery, so I have nothing to gain from maintaining surgical sterilisation as the standard.) I'm curious about ovariectomy versus hysterovariectomy though: even though the hormones aren't supposed to be there anymore after ovariectomy (doesn't the uterus also participate in some kinds of hormone secretion?), I still wonder about the risk of pyometra. And I'm sure those nasty leiomyomas of the uterus could still occur, though I'd imagine the incidence of mammary tumours would not increase with ovariectomy vs hyterovariectomy. Sorry for the mega-post.

brebis noire November 16th, 2008 12:29:43 PM

Brebis noire - I was also worried that my late sister's female dog would have a risk of pyometra later on and did read several studies (in english) published in England and Belgium. Some compare the two procedures and none could find any differences long term. The french dogs are 6 years old and we had them shipped to the States last june by an animal transporter.

Dominique November 17th, 2008 02:44:25 PM

I absolutely love the idea of having an injectable option for sterilization. Here are my reasons:

1. It could dramatically change the homeless pet situation worldwide. Imagine the end of needless euthanasia, where owning a pet is a priviledge, and breeders are no longer demonized, but appreciated for preserving genetic diversity. Oh, what a beautiful thing!

2. It would provide an option for financially struggling pet owners who don't want puppies or kittens. Again, helping that pet overpopulation problem.

3. More options means more power to the pet owner. Imagine having the choice between a laparoscopic oopharo/salpingectomy, a laparoscopic OVH, an injection, etc. based on what you would prefer for your animal.

Here's what I don't think it should be used for:

Cat neuters. I'm sorry, but a cat neuter takes about 3 minutes with injectable anesthesia. It is already cheap, effective, and quick. I would much rather those feral cat colonies have obviously neutered males. If the organization is examining, ear tipping, and vaxing this cat already, it will probably need the injectable anesthesia or  heavy sedation anyway.

Also, I think it would be relatively easy to keep it out of the hands of evil-doers (at least on a wide-spread level). Make this a scheduled/controlled substance. It would have the potential for human abuse, so treat it as such. While I know this isn't a perfect solution, it would make it a lot more difficult to just order some up or grab it off a shelf (it could be a 2-lock drug, meaning that there needs to be stored in a safe in a locked area, or a similar situation).

I look forward to see what scientific ingenuity can come up with!

Morgan November 23rd, 2008 08:05:35 PM