Senior Summer!

One of my favorite questions is: "how old is my pet in human years?" Interestingly that answer differs with the species and breed being discussed. A 10 year old chihuahua is a great deal younger than a ten year old mastiff. There are charts here in the hospital that will tell you that your ten year old cat is 56 years old while your 75 pound German Shepherd is 66 years old.

To make things simple we in the veterinary profession have created the phrase, "senior at seven" as a basic guideline to help us remember when we need to begin discussing senior care.

Senior citizens make up the vast majority of both the general pet population and the population here at Ventana. The good news about this is that it means that we are all doing something right.

Preventive care is what has allowed us all to reap the benefits of our pets' longer lives. Luckily as your pets have aged, and as the pet population too has aged, the veterinary community has adapted to to help this new population stay even healthier longer.

One of our senior citizens, Joy, resting after a hard day

Senior pets benefit from a holistic approach to care. Just as we have found that all things are interconnected in human medicine, it is the same with our pets.

Senior pets can suffer the same issues that humans. We see increased issues with joint mobility, weight gain, diabetes, thyroid issues, heart problems and the like. The good news is that many of these issues can be addressed if caught early enough.

Because pets age faster than humans, it behooves us to have them seen more often than yearly. A lot can happen in five years if you are in your sixties. We recommend twice yearly exams. This helps us better monitor fast changing issues such as dental health, weight and behavior.

Many things seen as a 'normal' sign of aging are not. Getting "slow" usually means getting sore. Changing behavior can be caused by early cognitive dysfunction, sight issues, hearing issues or pain. Drinking more or eating smaller meals can also be signs of illness.

While knowing the signs of illness are important, so too is well-checks with your veterinarian. We are better able to assess heart function, weight changes, dental health and feel the abdomen for abnormalities.

If you ask any one of us what we do for our own pets as they age you will receive the same answer - we all do annual blood panels on our senior pets. Even though all of our pets live with educated (one would hope!) veterinary professionals, we have all learned two valuable things over the years: 1) we cannot see what is going on inside our pets - no matter how good we are, and 2) vigilance pays off.

Everyone has a story about a perfectly healthy pet who came in for a routine exam or blood work and we found something that would have otherwise missed. We all like these stories, especially (obviously) if they have happy endings
. We hate seeing pets who have become symptomatic with disease and we catch things too late to help, or too far along to easily turn around.

We all love our pets or we wouldn't be in this profession. This is why often you will get the most candid answers when you ask us what we ourselves do with our own pets. At Ventana Animal Hospital, we consider that our gold standard. We offer nothing to you that we ourselves would not want offered to our own pets, and we will never offer you lesser care than we ourselves provide our own pets.