Pet surgery in Woodside, NY

• Lump and mass removal

  The most common soft tissue procedure we perform, priced from $480 depending on the size, location and depth of the mass and how much margin of healthy tissue needs to come out around it. A lump near a joint or over a bony area is a different job from the same-sized lump on a flank, and the estimate reflects that.

• Wound repair

  From bite wounds and lacerations to a degloving injury from a fence or a car, priced from $320 and depending entirely on how much tissue is affected and how it needs to be closed. Some wounds close directly; others need drains, staged closure over several visits, or a skin flap. A wound that is bleeding heavily or gaping widely is an emergency — see /emergency-checklist.html — rather than something to book in for later.

• General abdominal surgery

  Exploratory surgery for a suspected foreign body, bladder stone removal, and a range of other abdominal procedures are carried out here in one of our two surgical theatres, with the same monitoring standard as every other anaesthetic we run. Recovery is watched in the same recovery ward as every other surgical patient, and a written estimate covers the procedure and the anaesthetic before your animal goes anywhere near the theatre.

• What genuinely gets referred, and why

  Complex thoracic and cardiac surgery, cancer surgery needing a wider resection than we are set up to reconstruct, and cases needing specialised equipment or a much larger surgical caseload than we carry are referred to a practice built specifically for them. We would rather send you somewhere better equipped than attempt a case here that deserves a bigger team. This is a small list in practice, since most soft tissue work genuinely belongs here, but where a case sits matters more than any convenience to us in keeping it in the building.

• What a referral actually looks like

  We call ahead, send your animal's full record and any imaging, and stay in contact with the receiving practice rather than disappearing from the process once the referral letter is sent. Most families come back to us afterwards for the follow-up care and everything else, and we would rather keep that relationship than pretend we can do a case we are not suited to.

• Why every mass goes to the laboratory

  A lump's appearance and feel under examination is a reasonable guide but not a diagnosis, and an experienced eye can still be wrong about what a mass actually is. Sending it to the laboratory after removal answers that question with certainty rather than confidence, for a fee that is a small fraction of the surgery itself. We would rather spend that small amount on every mass than be confident and occasionally wrong about something that mattered.

• What the result actually tells you

  Whether the mass was benign or something that needs a different conversation, whether the margins removed were clear or narrow, and in some cases what, if anything, should be monitored for afterwards. We call to go through the result with you rather than send a report and leave you to interpret it. That conversation happens by phone, in plain language, with time for questions, rather than as a line item on an invoice you find out about later.

• In-house cytology versus laboratory histopathology

  A needle sample examined here during your appointment, for $85, gives a same-visit indication of what a lump might be and helps decide whether removal is urgent. Histopathology on the fully removed mass is a more definitive answer than a needle sample can ever give, because the whole structure, not a few cells, is examined. Cytology is a useful first step for deciding how quickly to act; histopathology is the answer you actually keep on file.

• What happens with a result you were not expecting

  We call you directly, explain exactly what the result means in plain language, and set out what, if anything, happens next, whether that is nothing further, a wider follow-up surgery, or a referral for specialist input. You are never left to find out from a letter alone. We would rather give you time on the phone to ask every question you have than deliver difficult news efficiently and move on to the next call.

• The record it leaves behind

  Every histopathology result is kept permanently against your animal's file, so if a similar lump appears somewhere else later, we already know what the first one was and whether that changes how quickly the new one should be looked at. This matters most for animals prone to multiple lumps over a lifetime, where the pattern across several results is often more informative than any single one on its own.

This is general information, not veterinary advice. This page describes a service. It is general information and it is not veterinary advice, a diagnosis or a treatment plan for any particular animal, because no page can examine your pet. If your animal is unwell, injured or behaving unusually, speak to a licensed veterinarian who can actually see it. In an emergency contact your own veterinarian or a 24-hour emergency animal hospital immediately.