Chapter 11
Inhalant Inductions
The last resort?
Lesley J. Smith
Department of Surgical Sciences, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Wisconsin, USA
- Q. When would be an appropriate time to consider an inhalant induction?
- A. The only time that an inhalant induction should be considered is if the patient is simply too fractious or wild to be handled for an IM injection, or if handling for an IM injection stresses the animal more than a chamber induction might (e.g., unhandled cats). Most domesticated dogs, even if fractious, can be handled at least long enough to hand inject IM drugs that will provide heavy sedation and chemical restraint (e.g., a combination of alpha-2 agonist, opioid, and ketamine or telazol). A combination of this sort will result in a dog that should be amenable to placement of an IV catheter and an injectable induction. Very fractious cats may need to be induced in a chamber/tank if personnel simply cannot get their hands on the cat. The cat may need to be “dumped” into the chamber from a crate or trap. Some exotic pocket pets, (e.g., sugar gliders, hamsters) can be induced using a face mask placed over the animal with delivery of inhalant via the anesthetic circuit. It is also common to mask-induce avian species after they have been sedated, due to the difficulty of IV access in awake birds and the respiratory depressant effects of most injectable anesthetics (see Chapter 44
Stay updated, free articles. Join our Telegram channel
Full access? Get Clinical Tree
