It depends on the surgery. With sedation and anesthesia, sometimes the dogs aren’t themselves when they come home. I like to tell my clients that when they're vocal, that does not always mean they're in pain. Sometimes they are what we call dysphoric, or just, they're a little out of it from the sedation. And so they're confused, or they're vocal because of that. So that's one thing I like to tell my clients.

Yes. If the dog has any type of surgical procedure that causes pain, we always do pain medication. Sometimes that pain medication may be administered in the hospital that will last them afterward. Or we may also send home additional medication for you to continue to give.

In general, the next day is what I recommend. We want to go light on their food on the day of surgery or the evening of because sometimes the anesthesia can make them a little sensitive with their stomach. As for returning to activity, it depends on the type of surgery done. In general, we would say two weeks because that's the general healing time for most incisions. And then, of course, if it's anything major or orthopedic surgery, that would be much longer.

Most of our surgeries are going to heal on their own. We may send home anti-inflammatories to help with the swelling or possibly antibiotics, depending on the type of surgery. There are certain procedures that we might ask you to wrap for protection. And if so, we would talk to you specifically about that.

You want to know what's safe for them and what's not safe. Do they have any restrictions? If they've had an incision or surgery, how do you pick them up if you need to? You need to consider what to feed the dog, whether they're going to need help going up and down steps, and activity level—you want to keep them on a leash almost always.