Animal Welfare Professionals

Hi there,

What do others do for community cats the require more care than can be done at a HQHVSN clinic?  We have a contract with the city to do their TNRs  but they will not do or pay for anything extra (we can use donations for some stuff.  We had two cats come in for surgery and our doctor declined them because they were too sick for surgery.  I hate that they left the clinic with out getting anything.  Would euthanasia have been a better solution?  I wasn't in the office that day otherwise I would've sent them back to their caregiver with medicine to at least try to get them healthy enough for surgery.

Thanks!

Hi Dara,  

We address our medical issues in several ways.  For basic wound care, our HQHVSN clinics will clean out a wound and give a Convenia shot if they feel it would be helpful (and just charge us for the medication given).  For things more serious, those cats will bypass the clinic (if we identify them in time) and go to a full service vet that is willing to work with cats in traps.  We get discounted services for these cats and we also fundraise  specifically for what we call our "Critical Care Fund".   Cats are very resilient, especially these community cats.  Therefore, unless they are critically ill or wounded, we do what we can to patch them up and send them back.  We make this decision with the vet who is community cat savvy the trapper, and with the caregiver.  An attentive colony caregiver is invaluable.  Sometimes a cat has to be kept in the clinic for a few days (always the shortest time possible, with a place to hide in the kennel) and if they are improving or have recovered from their surgery (as in an amputation or enucleation), they are returned.

In a case in which a cat may not be healthy enough for surgery, we would not return a feral cat in that condition.  What that condition is... and why it is deemed not healthy enough for surgery... is the key to what to do at that point.   Case in point... a week or so ago, we got a call from one of our HQHVSN clinics that they had a cat that was underweight, appeared ill and was likely pregnant.  They did not feel comfortable doing surgery on her because they didn't beleive she was healthy enough to be returned.  So she was transferred over to our full service clinic for a little more recon.   This vet decided to go ahead and do the surgery, but under different anesthesia protocols than the high volumn clinic.  As it turned out, the cat was very ill because of pyometra and a little URI.  She was spayed, medicated, and kept for a few days.  She was eating well when whe was returned to her family of outside cats.

Please reach out if I can be of any help to you with other questions or brainstorming.

Hi there,

What do others do for community cats the require more care than can be done at a HQHVSN clinic?  We have a contract with the city to do their TNRs  but they will not do or pay for anything extra (we can use donations for some stuff.  We had two cats come in for surgery and our doctor declined them because they were too sick for surgery.  I hate that they left the clinic with out getting anything.  Would euthanasia have been a better solution?  I wasn't in the office that day otherwise I would've sent them back to their caregiver with medicine to at least try to get them healthy enough for surgery.

Thanks!

Hi Dara,  

We address our medical issues in several ways.  For basic wound care, our HQHVSN clinics will clean out a wound and give a Convenia shot if they feel it would be helpful (and just charge us for the medication given).  For things more serious, those cats will bypass the clinic (if we identify them in time) and go to a full service vet that is willing to work with cats in traps.  We get discounted services for these cats and we also fundraise  specifically for what we call our "Critical Care Fund".   Cats are very resilient, especially these community cats.  Therefore, unless they are critically ill or wounded, we do what we can to patch them up and send them back.  We make this decision with the vet who is community cat savvy the trapper, and with the caregiver.  An attentive colony caregiver is invaluable.  Sometimes a cat has to be kept in the clinic for a few days (always the shortest time possible, with a place to hide in the kennel) and if they are improving or have recovered from their surgery (as in an amputation or enucleation), they are returned.

In a case in which a cat may not be healthy enough for surgery, we would not return a feral cat in that condition.  What that condition is... and why it is deemed not healthy enough for surgery... is the key to what to do at that point.   Case in point... a week or so ago, we got a call from one of our HQHVSN clinics that they had a cat that was underweight, appeared ill and was likely pregnant.  They did not feel comfortable doing surgery on her because they didn't beleive she was healthy enough to be returned.  So she was transferred over to our full service clinic for a little more recon.   This vet decided to go ahead and do the surgery, but under different anesthesia protocols than the high volumn clinic.  As it turned out, the cat was very ill because of pyometra and a little URI.  She was spayed, medicated, and kept for a few days.  She was eating well when whe was returned to her family of outside cats.

Please reach out if I can be of any help to you with other questions or brainstorming.

Hi there,

What do others do for community cats the require more care than can be done at a HQHVSN clinic?  We have a contract with the city to do their TNRs  but they will not do or pay for anything extra (we can use donations for some stuff.  We had two cats come in for surgery and our doctor declined them because they were too sick for surgery.  I hate that they left the clinic with out getting anything.  Would euthanasia have been a better solution?  I wasn't in the office that day otherwise I would've sent them back to their caregiver with medicine to at least try to get them healthy enough for surgery.

Thanks!

Hi there,

What do others do for community cats the require more care than can be done at a HQHVSN clinic?  We have a contract with the city to do their TNRs  but they will not do or pay for anything extra (we can use donations for some stuff.  We had two cats come in for surgery and our doctor declined them because they were too sick for surgery.  I hate that they left the clinic with out getting anything.  Would euthanasia have been a better solution?  I wasn't in the office that day otherwise I would've sent them back to their caregiver with medicine to at least try to get them healthy enough for surgery.

Thanks!

Have you thought about partnering with another group who has space to house community cats while they are under care? Money is still an issue but maybe grant money would be available to fund that partnership (grantors like collaboration).  Then when you decline a cat, you could contact the other group and have them take the cat for a few days until ready for surgery. That avoid the issue of having to make up a solution on the fly.

Hi there,

What do others do for community cats the require more care than can be done at a HQHVSN clinic?  We have a contract with the city to do their TNRs  but they will not do or pay for anything extra (we can use donations for some stuff.  We had two cats come in for surgery and our doctor declined them because they were too sick for surgery.  I hate that they left the clinic with out getting anything.  Would euthanasia have been a better solution?  I wasn't in the office that day otherwise I would've sent them back to their caregiver with medicine to at least try to get them healthy enough for surgery.

Thanks!

Hi there,

What do others do for community cats the require more care than can be done at a HQHVSN clinic?  We have a contract with the city to do their TNRs  but they will not do or pay for anything extra (we can use donations for some stuff.  We had two cats come in for surgery and our doctor declined them because they were too sick for surgery.  I hate that they left the clinic with out getting anything.  Would euthanasia have been a better solution?  I wasn't in the office that day otherwise I would've sent them back to their caregiver with medicine to at least try to get them healthy enough for surgery.

Thanks!