Urogenital surgery

At West Midlands Referrals we see male cats that get obstructed urinary tracts with mineral deposits that usually form in their bladders. These then get flushed out with urine, only to get stuck towards the level of the penis at the point where the urethra narrows. The urethra is the tube connecting the bladder to the outside.

Pyometra occurs relatively commonly in bitches, and involves the combination of infection in the uterus (womb) and progesterone hormone dominance from the ovaries.

Urethrostomy means creating an artificial permanent hole in the urethra, the tube that takes urine from the bladder to the outside. In male dogs this can be created:

A male cat had temporary difficulty urinating after mineral deposits obstructed the urethra, the tube that drains the bladder to the outside.

Pneumothorax involves collapsed lungs with air filling the space that surrounds the lungs within the chest cavity. Pneumothorax cases with severely collapsed lungs are potentially life-threatening, especially if the accumulation of air in the chest cavity is rapid and progressive leading to the ever-increasing pressure on ever collapsing lungs (tension pneumothorax). Pneumothorax cases typically fall into two groups.

Kutlis, an eleven-year-old, 9kg, Lithuanian street dog, presented to us at West Midlands Referrals with acute urinary outflow obstruction, a bite wound months before that had led to him losing the front half of his penis. He had reportedly been managing to pee until a couple of days before we saw him.

Buddy, the much loved male Staffie belonging to a lovely couple of die-hard Rockers, presented with a real problem – he couldn’t urinate. He had a large prostate cyst with a communication to the urethra, the tube from the bladder. When he tried to urinate, the urine shunted from his bladder to the cyst, and only a dribble came out. He was also losing a lot of weight and vomiting.

Gizmo had a penile obstruction caused by urethral calculi (mineral deposits). These were a little trickier than usual to spot as they were radiolucent meaning they don’t show up on radiographs unless contrast agent is used to highlight them.

A 7 year old neutered male Staffie presented to us at West Midlands Referrals with a urethral prolapse resected and sutured around a catheter. The catheter was then removed. The prognosis is generally very good for these cases.