Cardiomyopathy refers to any heart disease. This includes dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), where the heart valve becomes flabby, and mitral valve disease. The term "cardiomyopathy" essentially means a heart problem, with "pathy" indicating a condition or disease.

A heart murmur in dogs occurs when one of the valves in the heart, which separates the four chambers, doesn't close all the way. This allows blood to flow backward, causing turbulence that can be heard as a murmur. Types of murmurs can vary, but they all indicate that one of the valves isn't closing properly.

The most common heart diseases in dogs depend on their size. For small dogs, the most common disease is mitral valve disease, which can lead to left-sided heart failure. In large breed dogs, we see more dilated cardiomyopathy, where the heart muscle gets a bit flabby. This disease has been linked to feeding boutique-like grain-free diets, although the exact correlation is not yet fully understood. Other common heart issues include arrhythmias, which are abnormal heartbeats.

You should ask about their vaccine requirements, how much activity the dogs get, how often they are checked on, and what their contingency plans are. For instance, what if something floods? What if there's an emergency? What if they can't reach you? Make sure they have authorization to seek treatment for your pet up to a certain dollar amount that you're comfortable with while they're trying to get ahold of you.

If it's during business hours, they should contact your regular veterinarian. If it's outside business hours, then it is their responsibility to get them to a veterinary emergency clinic.

When considering a boarding facility for your pets, an important question to ask is about their after-hours care and monitoring. It's crucial to know who will be checking on the animals outside of regular business hours. I'm particularly fond of boarding facilities that have incorporated the use of cameras, allowing pet owners to check in on their animals remotely. This feature provides an added layer of reassurance, as you can visually confirm your pet's well-being anytime.

As someone who is deeply attached to my pets, I understand the desire to be constantly aware of their status. If I were to board my animals, I would likely be frequently monitoring them through such cameras. This kind of vigilance is akin to being a 'helicopter mama' for pets. Since I don't have children, my animals are like my surrogate kids, making their safety and comfort my top priority. The ability to have eyes on them at all times, even when I'm not physically present, is an idea I strongly advocate for and appreciate in pet boarding services.

There are a lot of anti-anxiety medications and holistic options that we can go through. These include an Adaptil collar that you can get on Amazon, calming canine pheromones or thunder shirts.

A certain amount of anxiety or sadness is to be expected. It really depends on the dog's personality. If they are going to be stressed or scared, then it's something to talk to your veterinarian about. We can discuss medications or other options like house-sitting or pet-sitting.

Any patient that is currently battling an illness, like if your dog has just been hospitalized for a few days for bloody diarrhea or vomiting or has just had major abdominal surgery, these are times that I would not recommend boarding. If we've had a major life or health scare, I would recommend finding someone to stay with your dog 24-7, like an in-house pet sitter or a family member.

When considering boarding for a pet, especially one recovering from a life-threatening disease, major surgery, or a significant health scare, it's important to weigh the risks. While boarding facilities do their utmost to provide care and supervision, they often have multiple animals to look after, sometimes as many as twenty, forty, or even fifty dogs at a time. This high volume of pets can limit the amount of individual attention and immediate care each animal receives.

In such scenarios, if something were to go wrong with your pet's health, the staff might not be able to address it immediately due to their responsibility for other animals. Therefore, I generally advise against boarding pets in these sensitive health conditions. The risk of inadequate immediate care in the event of a health complication is a significant factor to consider. It's always best to ensure that pets recovering from serious health issues receive the focused and specialized care they need, which might be challenging in a standard boarding facility.

There are some common misconceptions that they need for female dogs to have a litter of puppies beforehand. This is not true. There's no studies that show that there's any benefit to that. There's also some of the misconception that they need to have a heat cycle before they're spayed. There's no studies that show that this is necessary either. As far as male dogs go, depending on their breed, there are some different ages that we may recommend neutering.

There can be complications. The number one complication is the dehiscence of the incision site or the sutures coming out of the incision site. This is usually caused by the dog being too active when they first go home. Other complications that can happen are infection at the incision site or infection in the abdomen, which is less likely to happen.