A Survey Study on the Current Veterinary Practice and Attitudes to Anaesthesia and Analgesia for Spay Surgery in the United Kingdom.

Background: In the United Kingdom, spay surgery is routinely performed in dogs and cats by general practitioners. Data from a decade ago showed that, despite an increased attentiveness of veterinarians to peri-operative pain compared to the past, analgesia could be further improved.

Objectives: To investigate the current veterinary practice and attitude towards anaesthesia and analgesia for spay surgery in the United Kingdom.

Methods: An electronic questionnaire composed of 57 questions organised in 6 sections was designed using the Checklist for Reporting Results of Internet E-Surveys (CHERRIES guidelines) and distributed online via a hyperlink. Participants were recruited through both personalised email invitation and publication of the hyperlink on social media. Data were analysed with descriptive statistics, analysis of means and analysis of proportions, using commercially available software.

Results: Entries from 150 participants were used for data analysis. The proportion of participants who were confident in treating pain did differ by decade of graduation, with a lower proportion of confident colleagues graduated before 2001 (6%) and from 2021 (14%), compared to those graduated in the decades 2001-2010 (43%) and 2011-2020 (37%) (p = 0.007). Colleagues reported to implement multimodal analgesia for spay procedures of cats and dogs in 43% and 44% of cases, respectively. The proportions of participants who reportedly used locoregional blocks, mostly with lidocaine, in dogs (82%), were higher than that in cats (43%) (p < 0.001). Post-spay surgery pain was perceived by the participants as more intense in dogs than in cats (p < 0.001).

Conclusions: Despite an overall good level of attentiveness of British veterinary professionals to feline and canine analgesia during and following spay surgery, this study identified as areas of improvements perception and assessment of feline pain and implementation of locoregional anaesthetic techniques, particularly in cats.