Cat Spaying & Neutering - Benefits And Details Of Cat Spaying & Neutering

Cat neutering usually refers to male cats and we're basically removing their testicles so that they cannot reproduce and make more cats.

Dr. Mary Beth Soverns
Countryside Veterinary Clinic

Spaying a cat refers to female cats, and it's a surgery where we remove the ovaries in the body of the uterus so that they can not become pregnant and have kittens.

It improves them both behaviorally and medically.

We recommend spaying and neutering cats at six months of age. That's when they have developed their full length and height, and the bones have fused in. They're just becoming sexually active and that way they won't reproduce and make more cats and kittens.

So the medical benefits of spaying a cat in the case of a female cat means that, if she does not have a uterus then she cannot have a pyometra, which is a bacterial infection of the uterus. If she has had her ovaries removed in the spaying process, then that means that she cannot have ovarian tumors. And spaying her before she is six months of age will significantly decrease the chances of her having breast cancer as well.

If it's a male cat, the medical reasons are that, by removing their testicles, they cannot have testicular cancer and they won't get into as many catfights. And in both cases, the girls and the boys won't get sexually transmitted diseases either.

With female cats, their behavior is about the same but they don't come into heat. They can come into heats many times per year and they are meowing a lot, as they're uncomfortable. Their behavior is definitely different than your normal cat.

The male cats are going to wander further away if they're outside. They can get into catfights with other cats and so they also do spraying, as spraying is marking their territory. And they're most likely to do that if they're unfixed. So by neutering though, we're going to reduce a lot of those behaviors.

So the first thing is to raise your little kitten to be healthy at six months of age—make sure that they're really healthy, feed them, water them, groom them, trim their nails, play with them and develop a really, really healthy cat.

Before the surgery, the veterinarians will do a physical exam on them. They'll also take blood work and make sure everything's okay. After the surgery, they'll go home, generally the same day, and you'll get further instructions to give them a bit of medication like pain medication. They might have an Elizabethan collar on, and it'll be your job to make sure that they rest and that their incision heals well. Within 10 days, the sutures come out and then they're good to go like it never happened.

If you still have other questions and you'd like to reach out to us, you can call us directly at (410) 461-2400, you can email us, or you can reach out on Facebook. But please do reach out, and we'll get back to you as fast as we can.

Cat Spaying and Neutering - FAQs

Dr. Mary Beth Soverns
Countryside Veterinary Clinic

Spaying and neutering your cat has a ton of benefits. Number one, we're less likely to have a lot of unwanted cats and kittens. They can't find homes, or they might be out in the wild. Two, it has its medical benefits because the cats can't get testicular cancer, ovarian cancer, or breast cancer because they have been spayed or neutered. Behaviorally speaking, the male cats are not going to roam as far, they're going to make just a little bit better pets, and they're not going to get in fights with other cats. The girl cats won't come into heat three to six times a year. And in both cases, it will decrease the chance of them having sexually transmitted diseases.

Actually, the answer to that is no. The reason is, is because when cats come into heat, it increases the chance of them having breast cancer later on in life. And so in order to almost 100% eliminate breast cancer in cats, if you spay them at six months of age before they come into heat, we can eliminate that.

It might've helped if you had neutered it before it started spraying, and that's why we recommend neutering them at six months of age before they even thought about that. Once the cats have sprayed all over the house, it definitely has an odor, and it's a behavior that can be very repetitive. I will tell you that it could only help—it wouldn't make it any worse. By neutering them and then cleaning up the areas really well, you might be able to stop that behavior.

No, they'll come in as Bruce did, where he had a checkup from the veterinarian, and had blood work to make sure everything was fine before the surgery. The cat will be sedated then anesthetized, so they will be completely asleep through the surgery and then they will ake up. And when he goes home that very day, he'll go home with a little bit of medication, an anti-inflammatory or pain medication. And they do very well.

If you have a male cat that’s doing that because there are other cats in heat in the neighborhood, and he's being vocal, that may help stop that. Cats that are spayed and neutered should have normal loving behavior, the same behavior that you had before you spayed and neutered them. If they talked a lot and were very vocal and friendly, then they'll still be just like that.

If you still have other questions and you'd like to reach out to us, you can call us directly at (410) 461-2400, you can email us, or you can reach out on Facebook. But please do reach out, and we'll get back to you as fast as we can.