Interesting.  My pup Gadget was spayed on the advice of my vet, who said that spaying removed the possibility of her getting ovarian cancer, which of course is a real life-shortener for the female dog population.  Yet if there's been no comparative studies done on the knock-on effects of said removal, I guess I don't know if I've done her any favours overall.

Sad.  She's a Shih-Tzu pup, 10 years old, and the best companion I could've asked for, but I guess she may not be around for as long as I'd hoped...

Garth

I've never heard of a dog with ovarian cancer. I'm sure it happens, so who knows. It does reduce the risk of mammary cancer, and in some high-risk breeds like boxers, that's important.

Of course, spaying eliminates risk of uterine infections, etc. and the hassle for owners who don't want to manage a bitch in heat twice a year.

The bottom line though, is that you'll hear plenty about the health benefits, but nothing about the drawbacks of sterilization.

The reasons for that are purely political.

since the prime directive for any organism is first to live and second to reproduce it has always been a good possibility that the organs were useful.

ask any male over about 10 what their favourite organ is.

Thant settles it ... I'm keeping my overies!

and me my counterparts

I've had dogs all my life, everyone of them spade or neutered at 6 months old. Medium to large dogs, and not one of them has passed before the age of 14. (one was 19). So I personally will stick with keeping the pet population under control and have mine spade/neutered at 6 months.

Barb - I once flipped a quarter 6 times and got 6 heads. That is why I only flip quarters and always bet on heads.

Well, I think Barb has a point; for any one specific dog, longevity probably has more to do with environment, diet, breeding, available medical care, etc.

Like just about every decision in life, this one turns out not to be simple; you're trading the possibility of unwanted litters and ineruterine disorders for a possible shortening of your dog's lifespan. But it's important that owners have all this information before they decide.

Kate, can you explain what you mean by "reasons that are purely political"? I'm not current with this issue and I don't understand the implication.

Kate, while I suspect ovaries may convey survival benefit, in medicine that study would still be considered poor evidence.

For starters it is a retrospective study which is inherently biased. Secondly throwing out cancer further biases the study. As a physician and involved in research myself, that would concern me deeply.

Finally an odds ratio of 2 is poor especially if it had this confidence interval which almost crosses 1. In other words chance alone could have produced these results.

A high quality study would be prospective and divide dogs into two groups, one getting oophorectomies and the other getting control surgery. These would be followed.

I am not arguing against your hypothesis, I will agree that not all risks are discussed. However these risks may be marginal at best and could easily be balanced against possible risks of not spaying.

As noted above this is a very weak study.

It is also irrelevant.

We are talking about pets, here not people. As such they are like livestock. If I decide at some point to slaughter and eat my dog or cat (thus shortening its life), as long as I do it humanely then there would be nothing wrong with doing so.
People spay and neuter pets usually for lifestyle reasons - avoiding heat, dealing with puppies (including gassing or drowning them - are those deaths included in this study?) etc. That there may be a small shortening in lifespan - something that this study clearly does not prove conclusively - is a consequence I daresay the vast majority would be okay with -just as they seem willing to have purebreds that have significantly shorter lifespans than other breeds or hybrids.

People have pets for lots of reasons and choose breeds - large versus small, shedding vs non-shedding etc. - and I suspect longevity is well down the decision matrix. The politics of spaying and neutering have and should have very very little to do with it.

People,ITS NOT KATES STUDY!Its a study authored by David J Waters,DVM,PhD,Diplomate ACVS.If you dont agree with his study then say so.Kate just posted it.

I think some are missing the basic point behind the post. It's the "settled science" series, and in that context it's meant simply to illustrate that even some of the most conventional of conventional wisdom (that bitches spayed early will be healthier than those spayed later) may not be quite as advertised.

None of this is meant as an argument against spaying and neutering. It's about accepting without question what policy makers and some in the increasingly politicized (as in animal rights friendly) veterinary profession are telling people to be established science, when the truth is that they are often exaggerating the health benefits to sell public policy.

If you're interested, the data on health benefits of neutering males is much, much less convincing- there may even be increased risks for diabetes and autoimmune disease - yet you'd never know this if you ask the average vet.

I wonder what the side effects of getting a rottweiler ovary transplant are?

woof woof !!!

LOL !!!

I agree with you Kate, that people should try and read the evidence for themselves instead of generally accepting what they hear. However being able to crtically evaluate the evidence is a skill most people do not have. In order not to mislead people into thinking spaying was debunked I gave reasons as to why this particular study was flawed - in much the same way as the famous hockey stick is flawed.

That being said I do think there are survival and quality of life benefits in not spaying.

I think that general education and the media have led to the position that most people are in, in that they have no ability to analyse scientific literature.

I do think most people can learn how to do it, and it should be taught in high school along with economics (AND LESS SOCIALIST STUDIES).

I cannot speak for vets, but in medicine critically evaluating the literature instead of verbotem-ing your instructors has becomke the norm. In this way we are trying to become better at giving our patients sound advice.

I'm a vet. I'd love to see comparison studies between Europe and North America. In Europe, they take the uterus and leave the ovaries in. We take it all.

I have seen ovarian cancers in dogs, they are not pretty, and they are rare in my experience, mostly 'cause I spay everything by age 7.

Friends of Science just started a radio campaign that points out to the sun, you'll like it if you don't agree with the Gorezuki's Church of Glo-Bull Warming.

http://www.friendsofscience.org/

Bob Barker is gonna have kittens if he reads that study.

Kate our vet told us the same thing as Garth - if we spayed our female dog it would reduce the risk of ovarian cancer.

I think she was older than four though (she was bred twice) so it mightn't be all bad.

On another note, remember me?

only fools deal in absolutes

I'm extremely old school. In general, I would say, don't f[[ck with mother nature for convenience sake ... we really don't know what we are doing.

But of COURSE I remember you.

:)

I had my Golden Retriever spayed, not because of any supposed health benefits, but simply because I did want to take the risk of her getting pregnant.
By the way, she passed away at the age of 14 years and 10 months, which is quite elderly for the breed.