What are some of the risks and side effects of dog anesthesia?

Sedation and drowsiness are the big ones. Of course, we expect that but that sometimes can linger longer than we like. Another side effect can be that they're not only just sedated, but they're a little drunk or dysphoric, so they don't know what's going on, and they might act a little different than your normal pet would act. That’s why we take care to monitor them before, during, and after the procedure.

Risks with anesthesia are very low. The incidence is super low. In this practice, we've only had maybe two incidents in almost four years, so it's an extremely low risk. But there is always risk. The biggest one I would say and the one that scares most owners, including myself, is that we can lose them under anesthesia. They can go into cardiac arrest. It can be a drug reaction, an underlying heart condition that was silent and we weren't able to pick up on. Unfortunately, there are certain breeds of cats that can have silent heart disease like our sphinxes or Maine Coons, which is why we do a lot of preoperative monitoring and/or testing to make sure they can safely undergo anesthesia and the same with our canine patients. That's why every patient gets a preoperative exam, and for every patient over the age of four, our blood work, preoperative lab work is not optional. We do strongly recommend it for pets that are under four, but it is optional. What we're looking for is infection, red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets. What are our organ functions with our liver and kidney? What are our electrolytes doing? Do we have normal clotting times? Because if we're having surgery we need to make sure we can clot. So these are possible risks, possible complications from anesthesia. Even though we do place a breathing tube down to protect their airway when they're asleep, aspiration pneumonia or when we get contents into the lungs from the esophagus like if they regurgitate or vomit while they're under anesthesia is a risk. There are different complications with each surgery, and if your pet is having one of those surgeries, we’ll go over those risks with you before the procedure.

General anesthesia in dogs carries several risks including an uncontrolled airway, abnormal heart rate and rhythm, getting too cold, and the blood pressure risk of dropping too low. At Blue Oasis, we take measures to mitigate these risks such as intubating dogs, using medications to keep their heart rates up, performing ECGs, using a hot dog blanket, and blood pressure monitors. We also use IV catheters and IV fluids during the procedure to help with kidney function and perfusion.