What WILL You Do? Know your options and your limits

Transcription

1 What WILL You Do? Know your options and your limits Christine Wilford, DVM Founder, Feral Cat Spay/Neuter Project Seattle, Washington Would you stop in the middle of a freeway to check your navigation and see where to go? Hopefully not. But if you don t make contingency plans for handling sick or injured cats coming to your spay/neuter clinic, then you can expect the flow to come to a screeching halt, expect cats to stack up, expect delays and complications from cats waiting to be prepped and taken to surgery, and perhaps, expect unnecessary deaths. So make a plan. How? It all starts with your MISSION. If you don t have an official Mission Statement, then that is another topic for debate and discussion among your organization. If you do have a Mission Statement, then that should start guiding through your choices. For example, the mission of my organization was to spay/neuter in order to end the death of adoptable cats in shelters. Period. The mission didn t include fostering, fixing fractures, trapping, vaccinating, individual health care, or anything else. Just spay/neuter. We crafted that mission intentionally so that we would avoid mission drift, avoid spreading ourselves too thin and avoid gradually saying yes to more and more requests for help. Our mission statement saved us from debate and from wasting time that was instead spent on spay/neuter, what we came to call Feral Cat Prevention. I designed The Cat Web to show the first dilemma you may have. WHICH community cats will you serve? Any outdoor cat? Only stray unowned cats? Just feral cats? If so, how do you define feral? How will you tell a scared, fractious tame cat from a feral cat? Why turn away a tame cat that may produce kittens that could later become feral and reproduce? The Cat Web shows how all cats are on a spectrum, and any cat can be anywhere on the spectrum at different times of its life. At my clinic, we separated cats into two groups: reproductive or non- reproductive. If they could reproduce, they were welcome at our clinic. We did not see scores of wealthy owners taking advantage of our free or low- cost options. In fact, we occasionally saw caregivers and trappers taking feral cats to private practices and paying full price for some cats, because they wanted individualized care instead of assembly line care. Despite offering free surgery to any cat that enters our door, my organization stayed solvent, and no veterinarians went out of business because of us. Once you decide which cats you ll accept, you can begin to consider what care you will offer. This decision is where I implore people to think about your MISSION! Is your mission to provide the best

2 health care to each and every cat including spay/neuter? Or is your mission targeted at the entire cat population, to provide spay/neuter to each and every cat so that the population of cats in your community does not contribute countless kittens to the shelter population? Deciding the level of care you will offer is key and will drive all your other decisions. Basically, you re looking at individuals or populations. Then when something comes up like being asked to spay/neuter purebred Bengals your mission will help you stay on task and make the right decision. Sometimes it helps to think of life from the cat s point of view. Did the cat have a choice of being a hoarded purebred cat? Did the cat choose a rich owner who won t spend money on their cat? Did the cat have a choice to become tame thus be denied spay/neuter to improve its life? Will spay/neuter help each and every cat out there, regardless of breed and ownership status? Yep. If your organization has endless financial support, then you can provide every service for every animal at every visit. For the rest of us, thinking in terms of population as priority, you can equate the dollars spent on individual care as dollars taken away from spay/neuter and population management. It may sound a little callous, but it is reality and helps put decisions in perspective. Instead of asking how much a vaccine costs or viral test costs in terms of dollars, think in terms of surgeries worth. For example, performing one FeLV/FIV test on a cat is worth one surgery. If you see 50 cats in a day and test them all, it just cost you 50 surgeries worth to do those tests. Money = Spay/Neuter = Lives Saved The money spent on spay/neuter is the most effective at saving lives, because it prevents litters that end up in shelters, rescue groups, Craigslist, in a box outside of the grocery store or in a field. If these litters are prevented, then resources that would have been spent on health care and support for those kittens can be directed toward spay/neuter. FeLV Testing If 1 out of 100 FeLV tests is positive (without considering false positives and all that debate ), then it could cost you $700 to test 100 cats to find the 1 FeLV+ cat. And $700 FeLV tests = 30 spays worth. You just spent $700 to identify ONE FeLV+ cat (which may not really be infected) at the expense of not doing 30 spays. Which will save more lives? What about the lives saved by not putting a feline leukemia positive cat out in the community infecting other cats or when it gets sick? Check your mission statement for the answer. Is your mission to provide community health care to all cats in the community? Is your mission to provide comprehensive health care to each single cat in the community? Is your mission to eradicate feline leukemia? Is your mission to euthanize a cat with a positive test result that appears healthy because it MIGHT become a threat to the community s cats or pet cats whose owners knowingly allow them outside and knowingly risk possible exposure to disease? You will have to decide what you ll do with regard to your mission and your budget. Rabies vaccination Rabies vaccination is one service you must include that is not an option. Because the public health consequences are catastrophic, you must rabies vaccinate all cats old enough for vaccine. You could debate over which vaccine you use. Canarypox rabies vaccine (Purevax ) is available for 1 yr and 3 yr licensing now. It s guaranteed that if a vaccine- associate tumor develops, then Merial

3 (Boerhinger- Ingelheim) will cover the costs of diagnosis and treatment up to $5000. The 3 year Purevax costs quite a bit more than the 1 yr Purevax, and at the time of writing these notes, there was no shelter or non- profit discount. The other option is a killed rabies virus vaccination, which is far less expensive, made by multiple manufacturers and available with shelter and non- profit discounts. If a cat develops a vaccine- associated tumor, the manufacturers will not cover any costs, because the risk of tumor formation is disclosed in their literature. So which do you choose? An expensive rabies vaccine that purports to have less risk of tumor formation or a less expensive vaccine that allows more money to be directed toward spay/neuter? How many surgeries worth will you spend to get one vaccine over the other? It could be a tough decision for some people, but it comes down to population- centered mission vs an individual- health centered mission. FVRCP vaccination Is your mission to end overpopulation? Or to provide care for individual cats? If you pay $2 per FVRCP vaccine and you vaccinate 5000 cats per year, that s $10,000 you didn t spend on spay/neuter. Is panleukopenia a problem plaguing your community? If so, you may save many lives by vaccinating. But are cats dying in your local shelters because there are too many? Then spay/neuter might actually save more lives than FVRCP vaccination. Feline leukemia vaccination What about feline leukemia vaccination? To do or not to do. That s one question, because maybe some cats will be indoor only and never benefit from the vaccine, yet the vaccine costs surgeries, poses risks to some cats and has nothing to do with overpopulation. What is your mission? What if 5000 FeLV vaccines is 1000 surgeries worth? Are cats in your community at more risk from dying due to feline leukemia? Or do more die in your community because shelters run out of room and kill adoptable cats and kittens? Or turn away cats that they don t have room for? Refer to your mission and stay on task. Parasite treatment Treating for ear mites, worms and fleas feels really good to us when we provide these services. But figure out how much surgeries worth these services cost you. And consider that the benefits from these services are incomplete and short- lived. You may treat for ear mites, but you won t cure them. More than one treatment is required, and you must treat the entire colony to prevent re- exposure. So spending money on ear mite treatment provides no long- term benefit, while putting that money toward spay/neuter will change other cats lives forever. Same for deworming. You can t cure or prevent re- exposure. Good use of limited funds? Check your mission. Flea control? No long- term benefit. What is your mission? What will it cost in surgeries to provide short- term treatments to thousands of cats? You decide. Maybe the compromise is to treat the unthrifty, but not everyone. But refer to your mission and know the plan before the cats arrive. Just Raise Extra Money? Maybe now you re thinking you ll raise the money to pay for these treatments, right? Or you know a donor you could call and ask them to buy a month s worth of flea control. Well, if you can get the funding for that, why not ask for more spay/neuter funding and make your dollars save more lives?! We ve accomplished so much spay/neuter in our region through our clinic and through normalizing early spay/neuter before adoption that many vets tell me now that they hardly ever do a cat spay in

4 private practice. Most of their clients adopt kittens that are already altered. And our shelter euthanasia rates are lower than ever. Spay/neuter saves lives. Period. Pregnant cats Pregnant cats present an ethical dilemma for some clinics. At my clinic, the protocol was if a cat wasn t in active labor, we would spay her. Why? Because we have no shortage of kittens and because the procedure is humane. When there are more homes waiting than there are cats to be adopted, we ll stop spaying pregnant cats. Furthermore, mother cats don t always survive queening and don t always survive nursing. Committing a pregnant cat to birthing and lactating is not a guaranteed happy ending. And the kittens are not always healthy and can perish. Since there is no shortage of kittens, our policy is to spay. Other people disagree, which is fine, but the time to debate is NOT during your clinic. You must battle this out prior to the clinic when a pregnant cat is identified. Otherwise you re the stopped car in the middle of a 5 lane freeway causing all kinds of back ups and risks to those behind you. Small Incisions Please make a policy that small incisions are protocol. This seems obvious, but in vet school, surgeons always say making a huge incision for better exposure is good, because incisions heal side to side not end to end. Well, they hurt from end to end and take way less time, anesthesia and suture, if the incisions are small provided that the surgeon can be expeditious through a small incision. This is a skill to be crafted, but is worth striving for. It helps the cats and it helps your clinic get more cats done more safely. Lactating Queens Spay lactating queens. Make a policy in advance to get them done, so you don t debate it during the clinic. The kittens can still nurse, and the cat won t have to come back a second time for spay surgery. Declawing Declaws? Am I kidding? Nope. Not kidding. After seeing some deeply ingrown, infected, painful feet, we proactively started doing declaws on the deep- seated polydactyl nails. We don t declaw all the toes, nope. Just the polydactyl nails that are deep and potentially problematic. These nails can be impossible for a cat to sharpen and maintain, because they sit too far back between the other toes. Cats can t get them sharpened and shortened when they claw and scratch for nail maintenance. We declaw the extra nails that are already in trouble, and we declaw extra nails of other cats even if they re normal. As cats age, the nails thicken and can become a problem later in life. We d rather cure the cat while they re in for spay/neuter and prevent what could be a painful problem down the line. The extra claws aren t useful and only have potential to cause harm. Extra surgeries Tail amputation? Enucleations? If you see community cats, you will see cases of tail trauma, tail fractures and ruptured eyes. Do you want to treat these cats? Do you want to euthanize something that is treatable? Will you refer these cats to another veterinarian? How will these cases be handled? Check your mission. Decide before you see the cases coming through the line. Abscesses

5 Abscesses are not uncommon, but they aren t as common as one might imagine. We treat these, because they re easy, cheap and completely curable. Mother Nature s treatment is the swelling grows to a point of the abscess bursting, draining and usually resolving. We can help a cat by opening an abscess that hasn t drained, flushing the abscess and giving an antibiotic shot. Even most pet cats do not need drains, Elizabethan collars and continued flushing for days. If you re unsure about returning a cat with an extensive abscess, perhaps a trusted foster home can keep the cat a few days for monitoring. But decide in advance whether you ll refer these out, treat these and return to the colony, foster for a while, or what. Have a plan! The Oddballs If enough cats come through, you ll see some interesting cases. Three- legged cats. One- eyed cats. Old, healed fractures. Cauliflower ears. Swollen paw pads. Masses in the mouth. Dental disease. And so on. While it s easy to jump the conclusion of poor kitty when we see three legs or one eye, make sure you re not putting yourself in the cat s position. Look at the WHOLE cat! Is it shiny? Muscular? Alert? Doing well despite a disability? Or is it covered in lice, emaciated, dull, in trouble? A ruptured eye is a blind eye, so removing an eye doesn t change the cat s vision. One- eyed feral cats do very well after enucleation. Removing a ruptured eye eliminates pain and infection, then the cat heals. If a fracture is already healed when you see the cat, it s not painful anymore and the cat has usually figured out life with a gait deficit. An open or new fracture is painful will you repair? Refer? Euthanize? Foster and return to the colony? Figure out your plan. Refer to your mission: Population vs individual care. URI URI is inevitable. Depending on how sick they are, how fast your surgeon is, how well cats are monitored, how much you trust caregivers to recover cats after surgery, you may save more lives by spaying and neutering URI cats and kittens as they present instead of delaying surgery until they re well. Remember musical chairs? Sending these cases to foster homes fills up seats until these cats and kittens recover, get altered and then get adopted. When shelters and rescues are full, other cats and kittens are turned away and may not ever get spayed/neutered. Processing patients with URI may be less ideal for those individuals, but may expedite adoptions thus, increase the number of spays and neuters and, yes, save more lives. Decide on the parameters of which sick cats you will turn away and which you will accept for surgery. Refer to your mission and keep the goals in mind. Unthrifty Cats If you have a case that isn t quite normal but it s not ill enough to warrant euthanasia that day. It might get better and thrive after spay/neuter or it might decline and die after spay/neuter. This is a frequent dilemma and you need to have a plan. Your plan may depend on what resources you have, because those can dictate your diagnostics and prognosis xrays, lab testing, history. Some people use a feline leukemia test to decide about euthanasia, however, think of the cat this way: If the cat is really sick, what difference will it make if it s FeLV+? If you can t return the cat to the colony because it s so sick, then why test it? If it looks decently healthy but a bit sick, then a FeLV+ result is more likely to be a false positive, so why test it? Additionally, think about the responsibility of your program. Let s say you release a cat that is thin and weak, but you re hopeful that after spay/neuter it will gain weight and be fine. Can you be sure? Can it be fostered to be sure it s gaining weight? If you decide to simply spay/neuter and return to the colony, what happens if someone else finds the cat two days later? The cat looks thin and unhealthy, but you did surgery anyway. What is the

6 liability? What is the public perception? What is the responsibility of your organization for humane care? We look at the concept of: if I release this cat to its colony today, can it live a humane lifestyle as a feral cat? Can it find shelter? Can it evade predators? Can it get to food and water? Can it stay warm and dry? If it cannot maintain those basic lifestyle elements, then maybe euthanasia is a better option. How Long Before Return to Colony? How long to keep cats in captivity for recovery is always a question people may ask you. There are those who say Always keep them (fill in the blank 1 night, 5 nights, whatever) and one person may give the same answer for all cats. The honest answer is, it really depends on the cat. It depends on how difficult a surgery was a late pregnant queen or thin post- weaning mom versus a simple tomcat neuter. Some cats eat really well in captivity while others won t eat at all and need to be released asap. Some hold urine and feces for a day or two, and if they re on dry cat food, they can get dehydrated, get urinary crystals and develop other problem. Stressed and fearful cats are usually happier returned to their colony. If the caregiver has a temperature controlled recovery area, then keeping a trouble cat in captivity longer might be better. The absolute requirement for return to colony after surgery is that all of the anesthesia has worn off, and the cats have their abilities and wits about them such that they could recognize their surroundings, find shelter, food, and stay safe. Recuperate BEFORE Surgery, Not After If there is a cat that is in such bad condition URI, thin, whatever - that a foster home is going to keep it long term after surgery and nurse it back to health, then get in better health BEFORE SURGERY. If a queen has weaned kittens and needs to gain weight before returning to the colony, then have the foster put weight on her first, then spay. If a cat has a severe URI that the caregiver plans on treating, then have them do that BEFORE surgery. Having cats in the best health for anesthesia is ideal if the situation is such that someone plans to keep the cats long term anyway What is truly interesting about community cat work is that the vast majority of these cats are healthy. People talk about the community cats as if they re suffering, but if that were the case, we d be euthanizing most of the cats that come in. The reality is that we euthanize very few about 1/1000 cats. That means 999/1000 are doing well. Their lives improve further with spay/neuter. You improve their individual health while improving population health. Thank you for caring! Spay / Neuter Stop The Flow Save Lives

7 Getting Vets to Help Your SN Program Christine Wilford, DVM Founder, Feral Cat Spay/Neuter Project Seattle, Washington Purpose of this talk I m here to offer advice on how to identify and reach the vets that can help you help the animals. Some of what I say may be trite, but at some level, that tone will help you to hear it. There are generalizations here, and as with anything in life, there are always exceptions. Background of Spay/Neuter & Veterinarians The solution to pet overpopulation is prevention through spay/neuter, thus, veterinary support and participation are vital to a successful program. This lecture is intended to shed light on how to involve veterinarians in your program in a cooperative, productive and non- threatening way to them or to your program. Although the number one cause of death of healthy dogs and cats in the USA is euthanasia due to homelessness, this is not a disease studied in veterinary school. Although a major component of the cure to overpopulation and needless euthanasia is spay/neuter and is dependent on veterinarians, this reliance is not emphasized in veterinary school. Believe it or not, many vets are simply not in touch with overpopulation. Not to say that they don t know about it, but merely that it may be out of view and therefore, someone else s problem. The shelters and rescue organizations are dealing with it, right? Veterinarians are trained and tested on the anatomy and diseases of cats, dogs, chickens, horses, cattle, sheep, goats, pigs and other species. Imagine the lack of depth of this education upon graduation. New graduates have a foundation of basic knowledge, but truly do most of their important, practical learning after graduation. With increasing emphasis and availability of specialties such as neurology, cardiology, internal medicine, dermatology, etc, there is less time and attention focusing on general, every- day medicine during vet school. For example, I knew a bright new grad that knew how to diagnose and treat feline hepatic lipidosis, but had never seen, diagnosed nor treated a catfight abscess. Similarly, spay/neuter is taught but certainly not emphasized. In fact, many new graduates may perform only a handful of spays and neuters before graduation. Fortunately, pioneers such as Dr Julie Levy and Dr Bonnie Griffin have launched large- scale spay/neuter programs at a few vet schools. These women are heroes. We see more vet schools participating in shelter work, so more students are aware of shelter populations as well as more experienced in spay/neuter prior to graduation. Hopefully the trend will be for all other veterinary training programs to follow suit. One trend that may help spay/neuter programs is the increasing proportion of women entering veterinary school. According to statistics, women are more likely to become employed veterinarians rather than owners, and more likely to seek part- time employment. This is a measured trend

8 documented from following up on recent graduates. Because women may want to start families and not work hours a week as a practice owner, they can be more accessible for the routine of spay/neuter work. At spay/neuter clinics, the working hours are more predictable and workdays are typically shorter. Many women vets are not the primary money- earner for the family; thus, some can afford to work part- time and for less money (spay/neuter typically pays less than full private practice positions). With more women in the profession than before, there are also more moms in the profession that need to pick up kids from daycare before 6pm and get home, rather than work the hour days typical of this profession for so many years. These needs result in more veterinarians that may consider working for spay/neuter programs. Another trend in newer graduates is the awareness of our culture s neglect and responsibilities toward companion animals. We simply see more veterinarians showing more interest in what they can do to help animal causes than ever before. Animal overpopulation issues, among other animal welfare issues, are more available to our culture in general and thus, to our veterinarians. In fact, Dr. Bonnie Beaver, past President of the American Veterinary Medical Association was once quoted as saying, It is time to get our heads out of the sand. Even the careful old institutions can evolve. Know Your Market: To lure these veterinarians into working with you or for you, you need to know what makes them tick. Why would they want to help you? How do you sell your product to them? One very common misconception about veterinarians is that they all have a deep love of animals. While many do, I know many who do not. They are attracted to the profession for a wide variety of reasons. Earning potential can be attractive. Veterinarians can be their own bosses. Some see the opportunity to avoid a career working in a cubicle. Some folks are attracted to the intellectual stimulation of complex medicine but didn t go to medical school to be an M.D. Some people enter vet school, because it runs in the family. Some are breeders or veterinary technicians who see the vet profession as a way to do more for their own animals while earning a living. Some become vets because they can t stand working with people, but don t realize that people are part of the veterinary career. Even if a vet does deeply love animals, it does not simply translate into a desire to do spay/neuter work to fight overpopulation. There is much more to consider. Another misconception is that all veterinarians make loads of money and owe it to the community to do service work. Well, some do have lots of money, but many do not. When I graduated in 1987, the average starting salary was $20,000 per year with few benefits, and men earned about $2000 more than women. Starting pay now is typically production- based and can easily be a six- figure income per year with full benefits. However, I graduated school with only $12,000 in student loans, a fairly average amount owed at that time. Student loan indebtedness can easily reach $100,000 or $200,000 now. Newer vets may be earning more, but they also owe more. While the pay scales appear attractive, the veterinarian s day is rarely 8am- 5pm. I don t know anyone that works a day like that in regular practice and earns that level of income. Most vets work at least 10- hour days if not more, and if hired for a 40 hour week, it is common to work hours in total at least. Many work 5-6 days a week. Unscheduled time is often used for returning phone

9 calls, checking on patients, reviewing lab work, calling for consults, and work that is not directly related to appointments, procedures and surgery. They may or may not be getting paid for this work. The workweeks are often long, mentally and emotionally fatiguing and when they leave work, they often want to do something far unlike veterinary medicine for relaxation and enjoyment. Which brings me to another point. Veterinarians are not just veterinarians! They are business owners, musicians, athletes, actors, marathon runners, hikers, photographers, parents, caregivers to their aging parents or spouse/children, PTA members, breast cancer survivors, victims of depression, breeders, couch potatoes, reality- show junkies, search & rescue volunteers, and anything else you can possibly name. There may be and likely are more things that stir more excitement and passion within than their career and the animals for which they care. When given any spare time, there are likely to seek non- veterinary things to engage their minds and bodies. Turning Mundane into Rewarding Spay/neuter surgery is neither glamorous nor exciting. Spay and neuter surgeries are considered mundane by most veterinarians. Except for the occasional anomaly, these surgeries are not often intellectually stimulating. Furthermore, some veterinarians actually look down on vets that do only spay/neuter work. How ironic that the vets doing the most work to end the number one cause of death for dogs and cats in the USA may get the least respect from their colleagues. Hence, it may require a little marketing on your part to engage the vets to do your surgeries. Stress in veterinary practice comes from many areas, and the lack of some of these stress factors in your program can work in your favor. In most spay/neuter programs, vets do not have to make phone calls, talk to clients, do physical exams, write medical records and answer questions about diet, vaccines, behavior and other areas. Use these perks as enticements to attract vets to do your surgeries. (I ve included a sample letter that I ve used successfully to recruit volunteer veterinarians.) When vets realize that they can waltz in, do surgery, only do surgery, and leave afterward, the job is simpler, easier and less stressful. This makes it very attractive, and they will want to know more about what you want from them. Many vets may feel concerned about the quality of work they ll be asked to do, and may actually fear becoming associated with something of ill repute a chop shop! When you first approach a vet to help, preempt the questions with reassurances. Begin by providing information to set their minds at ease. Describe the anesthetic protocol (drugs used, how doses are determined/administered, any gas anesthesia, oxygen available, reversal drugs on hand) what level of support staff do you have (veterinarians who consult, licensed techs, veteran volunteers, career vet assistants, veterinary students), how many surgeries do you expect per hour, are surgical packs sterilized between cats, what type of suture is used, who will watch/monitor the cats in recovery, do you provide additional pain relief, what safeguards are in place if there are complications? If veterinarians can be assured that the level of practice is close to private practice or better, then they will more likely be willing to consider helping. Ask other vets who have worked with you if you can use their names as examples when approaching new vets about joining your cause. Peer recognition can be a powerful motivator. Once you get some vets that you like, let them know that they can bring vet friends of theirs. Vet- to- vet peer pressure works well here, and the vets can do the convincing so that you don t have to. And

10 they tend to have more fun volunteering with a friend, especially if it s a vet that doesn t work at their own hospital and they rarely have time to see each other. Volunteering can become a semi- social event for your vets. To keep the vets happy, treat them as professionals. Show them that you respect their time by not monopolizing it. If you agree for them to work a certain shift, make sure they are free to go at the end of that shift. Most would stay anyway, but you want them to know that they are not obligated or pressured into staying longer than agreed. Many vets will give more than you ask, but vets can be turned off by people that ask too much which may lead to them not volunteering at all. We are all busy that is our culture. Acknowledge their busy schedules, stressful days, and their generosity to give their time or to work at a discount. Make your communications brief and to the point. If you cannot pay them, then it is especially important to give them a good feeling and recognition for what they do for you. SAMPLE VET LETTER ON NEXT PAGE

11 Dear Doctor: Thank you for your interest in the Feral Cat /Spay/Neuter Project. We are a completely independent, donation-funded, non-profit organization, which is not affiliated with any other organization in any way. Since trap- neuter- return has become a well- accepted compromise to deal with the plight of feral cats, the Feral Cat S/N Project was organized with a single purpose - to sterilize feral cats. We provide surgical services to individuals that feed ferals but may not be able to afford surgery for every cat they encounter. Those cats are presented to our free monthly clinics. After four years of free monthly clinics, the Project has seen over 4000 cats and kittens. The surgeon s role is simple perform surgery. There is no client contact, no medical record to write, and no handling of conscious cats. We try to start surgeries by 9 AM and have trained technicians staffing a surgical suite set aside for spays. Cats are brought to each surgery table anesthetized and fully prepped. Newly autoclaved surgical packs are used for each cat and strict sterile technique is employed. Incisions are closed with an absorbable subcuticular overlayed with surgical glue. When one surgery is complete, another prepped cat is brought to the surgeon. When all spays are done, the surgeons go home. The lead Project veterinarian stays until all cats are safely recovered. Neuters are also performed by doctors, are performed in the prep room and are not sutured. Caretakers are instructed to keep cats overnight and release the following day. Before any procedure is performed, each cat is anesthetized by the anesthesia team of volunteers with an IM combination of Telazol, ketamine, xylazine and atropine through a squeeze cage or net. Each cat entering the clinic is scanned for a microchip, in case it is a lost or abandoned pet. Buprenorphine is used for pain relief for each spay. Each cat of appropriate age is given a rabies vaccine. Caretakers may purchase MLV FVRCP vaccines. Regardless of age, each cat is ear tipped (right ear for females, left ear for males). Ear tipping is an international standard used to identify cats as sterile; ear tipping does not mean feral. Approximately one centimeter is removed across the top of one pinna making an obvious, deliberate defect in the ear s appearance, not to be confused with a fight wound. A properly ear tipped cat is easily identified when viewed from a distance or within a trap or carrier, allowing the cat to avoid future anesthesia and unnecessary surgery. Many caretakers are able to confiscate kittens from feral queens, but may or may not be able to catch the queens. Like the shelters in this area, the Project supports early spaying and neutering as an important opportunity to reduce pet overpopulation as well as feral cat prevention. The Project will spay or neuter kittens as long as they are at least two pounds and seemingly healthy. One concern for the Project as well as local veterinarians has been whether pet owners will take advantage of the free services for pet cats in order to avoid paying for services at a private practice. The built- in deterrents against owners presenting pet cats are strong. 1) Owners risk that their pet cat could be tested for FeLV and euthanized if positive. 2) We retain the right to adopt out any cat that enter the clinic if an appropriate home is available and the cat is adoptable. 3) There is no exception to the ear tipping policy.

12 Because of a documented 1% incidence of FeLV + results in the first 500 cats seen at the FCSNP clinics, we cannot monetarily justify routine testing for FeLV. Cats with poor health regardless of FeLV status that are unable to be treated will be euthanized after sedation. The support of veterinarians and technical staff in this community has been solid and impressive. Without surgeons, the Project could not live. Every veterinarian who has sacrificed a few or many Sunday hours is greatly appreciated. We maintained staffing with volunteer veterinarians until November, 2000, but we found ourselves drawing upon the same small group of individuals. To expand the pool of available veterinarians and avoid burnout of our valued surgeons, we offer $30 an hour for surgeons that can complete spays in 30 minutes or less. We are happy to be able to pay doctors for their valuable time and skills. Because we are a free clinic and rely on donations for funding, we do, of course, greatly appreciate any surgeons willing to donate their time or offer their compensation as a donation to our Project. Monetary donations are deductible since we are a 501c3 non- profit organization. We schedule surgeons from 9 AM to approximately noon or 1pm, until all surgeries are complete. To keep our days shorter, we recently limited cat reservations to 100 cats. With seven or eight surgeons, we have been able to be finished by 12:30 PM. To sign up for your shift, request directions or ask general questions, please call. To speak with the lead veterinarian or for more detailed information, please call or Dr.. For more general information about the Project, to make donations, to request brochures or to learn more about feral cats, contact the Project or visit the website at Thank you again for your interest in the Feral Cat Spay and Neuter Project. Sincerely, OTHER WAYS YOU CAN ASSIST THE FERAL CAT SPAY/NEUTER PROJECT: Pay for an associate s time to do surgery at one of our clinics. Donate your surplus supplies. Sponsor a donation can on your reception counter. Make the Project s brochures available to your clients. Having a good month? We always welcome tax- deductible monetary donations. Refer clients to our website to learn more about feral cats.