Dr. O'Hara's Operating Room: From Routine to Remarkable

What Are The Most Common Surgeries You Have Performed?

Ever wondered what happens when your furry friend needs surgery? Dr. O'Hara pulls back the curtain on veterinary surgical procedures in this enlightening episode of Tail Talk.

From routine spays and neuters to emergency foreign object removals (corn cobs, anyone?), we explore the most common surgeries performed at Abingdon Animal Medical Center. Dr. O'Hara shares valuable insights on what pet parents should expect before, during, and after their pet undergoes a surgical procedure. You'll learn why younger animals typically recover faster, how proper pain management accelerates healing, and practical tips for managing your pet's recovery at home.

The highlight of our discussion centers on Dolly, a mini schnauzer rescued from the streets on a rainy winter night. Her remarkable story involves a massive, heart-shaped bladder stone that was causing serious health complications. Dr. O'Hara walks us through how surgical intervention not only removed the stone but normalized Dolly's kidney values and potentially saved her life. It's a powerful reminder of how veterinary surgery can transform outcomes for our beloved companions.

Whether you're preparing for your pet's upcoming procedure or simply want to understand what happens behind the scenes at a veterinary surgical center, this episode delivers expert knowledge with Dr. O'Hara's signature blend of compassion and clarity. Give it a listen, and you'll walk away with a deeper appreciation for the surgical care that helps keep our four-legged family members healthy and happy.

Ready to schedule an appointment or have questions about your pet's surgical needs? Contact Abingdon Animal Medical Center at 276-628-9655 or visit MyAbingdonVet.com. Your pet deserves the perfect blend of small-town comfort and state-of-the-art care!

To learn more about Abingdon Animal Medical Center visit:
https://www.MyAbingdonVet.com
Abingdon Animal Medical Center
19586 Dennison Drive
Abingdon, VA 24211
276-628-9655

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to Tail Talk with Dr O'Hara, where Eastern
Tennessee and SouthwestVirginia's favorite pets get the
spotlight they deserve.
He's the heart behind AbingdonAnimal Medical Center, combining
small-town charm withstate-of-the-art veterinary care
.
Whether your furry friend purrs, barks or just steals your
socks, this is the place fortips, tails and a whole lot of

(00:28):
tail wagging.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
From routine procedures to life-saving
operations, veterinary surgerycovers a wide range.
Dr O'Hara walks us through themost common surgeries performed
at Abington Animal MedicalCenter and what pet owners
should know before and after.
Welcome back everybody to TailTalk.
Skip Monty here, co-host slashproducer, back in the studio
with Dr O'Hara of AbingtonAnimal Medical Center.

(00:59):
Dr O'Hara, how's it going?
It's going great, skip, good tobe here.
Well, we're glad to have youhere too, and I know something
we've talked about pardon me inthe past is surgeries and how
that works and what yourthoughts are on that, and so
really curious to know what aresome of the most common
surgeries that you've performedthere at Abington Animal Medical

(01:19):
Center.

Speaker 3 (01:20):
Well, there's some you know, everybody knows about
is like spays and neuters, right.
Young puppies and kittens,right.
And then I would say the mostcommon thing I do is take
growths off skin and underneaththe skin, sub-q growths, and
that's just real common.
You take them off, make surethey're not cancerous.
If they are cancerous, you wantto make sure you send them off

(01:40):
and make sure your margins areclean and what the prognosis of
the patient's going to be.
Send them off and make sureyour margins are clean and what
the prognosis of the patient'sgoing to be.
And there's other oddballs.
You know I do enucleations.
You know that's where the eyeis very diseased or something or
popping out, and you got totake it out.
I mean there's some wild stuff.
There's splenectomies, wherethe spleen is bleeding or it's
got a mass on it, and that's aninternal surgery and we'll go

(02:02):
take it out.
You know, sometimes young dogsare, you know they get into
trouble and they eat somethingthey're not supposed to and it
causes an obstruction and I gotto go in and remove it.
A couple weeks ago I had a dogeat a corncob that did not want
to go through, so you gotplugged up and I'd take that out
.

Speaker 2 (02:21):
So oh my gosh, surgically.
Yeah, wow, cornc cob.

Speaker 3 (02:26):
Yeah, you know the summer, summer causes some.
You know fun and barbecues andhe, he wanted to have some fun.
I don't think it was worth itin the end, but he did fine.
He's perfectly back to normal.
He's great, so learns less thanthat, probably, probably not,
but probably not, probably not.

Speaker 2 (02:43):
That's that's so many , so many dogs.
Well, what about this I'vealways been curious about?
Do you do cataract surgery fordogs?

Speaker 3 (02:50):
I do not.
That's a specialty thing, butyou can take out cataracts in
dogs, but an ophthalmologistwill do that.
There's veterinarians justpractice eyes all day and
they're specialists and they cando that though.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
Gotcha Just like with humans all day and they're
specialists and they can do thatthough.
Gotcha, just like with humans.
Well, you mentioned spay andneutering cats and dogs is
probably the most common surgerythat you do.
Is the recovery process forthat, for spay and neutering?
How does that compare versusother more complex procedures?

Speaker 3 (03:20):
I think it's really simple.
You know it's very smallincisions.
You know, bury their sutures.
I don't think they can reallymess it up unless they lick
obsessively.
But you know, we kind of put,you know, an e-collar on them to
help them not do that.

Speaker 2 (03:39):
An e-collar?
Yes, a cone, oh, the cone ofshame.
Yes the cone of shame.
Sorry, you probably don't likecalling it that, but I love it
from that.
What's the movie?

Speaker 3 (03:48):
dogs for dogs and cats, some dogs are just statue
in it.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
They won't move until Wow, Wow.
I just don't see my beaglebeing able to do that.
But anyway, are there any news?
Sorry.

Speaker 3 (04:00):
Skip, but they usually recover quickly too,
because they're usually youngerright.
The younger you are, the easierit is to recover.

Speaker 2 (04:06):
So Right, and most of the time that happens when
they're puppies, right?
Yes, gotcha, gotcha.
Well, are there any surgeriesthat you've seen increase in
frequency over the years,increase in?

Speaker 3 (04:19):
frequency you know like well there's.
Orthopedic issues are reallybecoming more commonplace.
Like they we call it a ccl tear, a cranial cruciate ligament.
In dogs.
On the human side you wouldcall it the acl tear, the
anterior cruciate ligament.
But that's a common thing.
I don't fix those, I send thoseoff because orthopedics now is

(04:41):
so streamlined with specialistsand the rehab process so and
there's some great places closeby that I can send them to, but
that that's, that's an injury.
I mean, I see that every weekalmost wow, is it?

Speaker 2 (04:54):
is it?
Do you think there's a reasonfor that?

Speaker 3 (04:55):
there's a lot of theories on it.
I mean it could be just like aperson.
It was an acute bad movementthat blew the ligament.
There's also a lot of thoughts.
There's a genetic component toit and some breeds too.
So yeah, and that the CCLliterally is degenerating with
time.
You know, kind of.

Speaker 2 (05:16):
Gotcha.
Well, how do you post surgery?
How do you manage pain andcomfort for the patient?

Speaker 3 (05:24):
Well, you definitely put them on post-op pain
medications.
We've got, you know, a coupleoptions for that.
We got anti-inflammatories,then we got gabapentin, things
like that, depending on the painlevel.
That's going to be on follow-up, but you know, pain prevention
is key because they've shownthat if you stay on top pain

(05:44):
control they will heal faster,you know.

Speaker 2 (05:47):
So we really try and do that.
I'm sure humans are exactly thesame way.
So does any particular surgerythat you've done in the recent
or not necessarily recent past,but in your career that really
stands out to you Well.

Speaker 3 (06:02):
I'm glad you brought that up because there was one I
did not too long ago that reallyresonated how to me how surgery
can really help a patient.
So I'm going to talk about thisdog, dolly, and I have
permission from her folks todiscuss this and they're really
great people.
So I'm going to shout out toDave and Hannah Pollard for

(06:23):
rescuing Dolly.
They found Dolly on a coldwinter night just in the middle
of the street and it was rainingand there was just this little
mini schnauzer in the street.
I'll show her Dolly.
This is Dolly.
It's just kind of after.
They found her and they lookedfor her owner on social media or
who had her previously for along time.
So they did their due diligencewith all that but never heard a

(06:47):
peep.
So they kind of took care ofDolly.
But they noticed Dolly wasurinating all the time, small
amounts with blood in it.
So they brought her into me,you know, diagnosed her with a
UTI, put her on antibiotics andall that, but it continued.
So I was like let's do someimaging, let's see if there's
something else and Skip.

(07:08):
What we found was Dolly is alittle 18-pound dog and this is
a little bright white thing onthe x-ray here that is a bladder
stone.
That is huge.
Yeah, that's big.
So we had to take Dolly tosurgery and did what's called a
cystotomy, where we open up thebladder and actually take that
stone out, and so I performedthat and she did great post-op.

(07:31):
One thing that she wasstruggling with when we were on
her pre-op blood work was herkidney values were sky high.
But after we took the stone outshe recovered great and her
kidney values went back tonormal and I honestly think the
surgery saved her life and I'mreally thankful for the Pollards
for bringing her in and theypaid for everything.

(07:54):
And this is just a dog theypicked up off the street and we
got a great outcome with Dolly.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
Wow, so that's amazing.
That thing was huge yeah.

Speaker 3 (08:06):
I actually do, I did, I did.
Do you want to see it?
I mean, sure, yeah, absolutelyPut my glove on, cause it
doesn't matter.
But one cool thing about it,and I don't know if you'll be
able to appreciate it, but itkind of looks like a heart.
It does.
It's just a big kind of heart.
So I thought that was just acoining of the story, because
they're in love with Dolly nowand she's got a forever home, so
that's great.

Speaker 2 (08:27):
Oh wow, so I'm surprised they didn't want to
keep that.

Speaker 3 (08:30):
Well, no, it's a biological sample.

Speaker 2 (08:33):
You can't keep it.
Oh it yeah, oh okay, oh well.
Well, it's very cool.
It could be a good paperweighttoo.
Well, what advice do you givepet owners to help their pets
heal safely at home once thesurgery's over?

Speaker 3 (08:49):
well, take it easy, just like your doctor would tell
you if you just you know, didan abdominal surgery on you.
They probably like take it easyfor a little bit.
So sometimes we give thempost-op little sedatives, take
the edge off them so they're notrunning around like wild.

Speaker 2 (09:04):
You know wild childs of course it's hard to do, yeah,
hard to active dog.
It's hard to keep.

Speaker 3 (09:10):
Keep them still, yeah right, and then you brought up
the cone of shame, of course,and then pain management, and
you know, just stuff like thatJust let them?

Speaker 2 (09:20):
maybe, maybe.
Well, I need to ask you thisWhenever I take my dog I used to
have several, but I'm down toone now but when I take them to
the vet, I always swing by theDairy Queen and get a pup cup.
Is that something that you saystay away from, or does it
matter?

Speaker 3 (09:34):
What exactly is in a pop cup.
That was good, I mean I thinkit's ice cream.

Speaker 2 (09:38):
I think it's just ice cream is it?
You know, I don't think it isis that a problem?
I'll find out okay, I'll findout for sure, but if, but if
there is dairy in it, is that aproblem for dogs?

Speaker 3 (09:51):
well, it's not that.
Almost all animals becomes alittle bit lactose intolerant
after they get done.
They are weaned off nursing, soI don't know.

Speaker 2 (10:02):
We'll check that out.
I'll call Dairy Queen and findout for the next episode.
All right, man?
Well, dr O'Hara, thank you forbreaking all that down.
A lot of us have to deal withsurgery with our pets, and so we
really appreciate you sharingyour knowledge with us with such
care and clarity.
And so we really appreciate yousharing your knowledge with us
with such care and clarity, andwe'll catch you back in the next
episode of Tail Talk, wherepets always come first.

(10:22):
Thanks, kid, thank you, we'llsee you next time, doc, I'll see
you.

Speaker 1 (10:32):
Thanks for joining us on Tail Talk with Dr O'Hara.
If your four-legged familymember needs a checkup, a
stylish groom or just a cozyplace to stay, give us a call or
text at 276-628-9655 or visitMyAbingdonVetcom to book your
appointment.
Abingdon Animal Medical Centera small town field with

(10:55):
state-of-the-art care and plentyof belly rubs.