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SENIOR PET CARE

Owners of older pets often notice their loved ones feeling the effects of the extremes in climate.

Many older pets suffer from arthritis or find that their kidneys, liver and/or heart are not as healthy as they once were.

Although we can not offer a magic cure for old age, we can certainly make sure the older pet is comfortable and with us for as long as possible.

Should we find anything wrong with your pet, we can start on early remedial action (e.g. special prescription diets, anti-arthritis medications) to either treat or slow down the aging process.

Urine examination

A urine sample can give a lot of information about the state of health of the body.
The tests look for the presence of sugar (diabetes), infection, kidney/ bladder stones or damaged kidneys. They also look for the ability of the kidneys to concentrate urine.

Did you know...

In humans, you can donate one kidney to a close relative and live a happy normal life. Should your remaining kidney lose up to 50% of its ability to concentrate urine, you can still appear normal although you may be drinking a bit more and making dilute urine. Kidney blood tests can be normal even at this stage.

In other words, you can loose 3/4 of your total kidney function and still have normal kidney blood tests.

The same rule applies to dogs and cats. A senior health check urine examination looks at the concentrating ability of the kidneys to detect early reduction in kidney function. The earlier it is detected, the easier it is to treat.

Blood Pressure tests

A Doppler blood pressure machine can detect an abnormal blood pressure. This can be an early indicator of serious illness e.g. heart disease, kidney failure, thyroid problems, and hypertension in cats.

Blood tests

With our $35,000.00 in house laboratory, we can perform complete haematology, biochemistry and electrolyte tests within 30 minutes of blood collection. Biochemistry tests check out the kidneys, liver, cholesterol, blood sugars and other body systems.

Haematology tests detect abnormalities such as anaemia, infection and blood disorders.

Cardiac check-up

Many older pets have undetected cardiac disease resulting in decreased exercise tolerance, coughing and/or swollen livers.

Mark has received post graduate training in small animal cardiology. He will examine the cardiovascular system to ensure there are no abnormalities eg heart murmurs, irregular heartbeats, heart failure.

Most cardiac conditions respond well to the newer medications being used in human medicine at present.