Before Clinic Day: The Hidden Work Behind a Spay and Neuter Clinic
Veterinarian explains how to care for dog after spay procedure.
When people think about a spay and neuter clinic, they picture veterinarians working and families waiting with their dogs and cats.
It looks straightforward. A tent. A line. A surgery table.
What’s harder to see is everything that has to happen for that clinic day to exist at all.
In the communities where Global Strays works, clinics are not single-day events. They are the visible result of weeks of preparation, coordination, and physical labor carried out by people who know the terrain, the risks, and the realities on the ground.
Families wait to be seen at a Global Strays’ Spay and Neuter clinic.
The Work Starts Long Before Clinic Day
Long before a date is set, local teams begin with a census. That means walking through neighborhoods door to door for a week or more, speaking with families, counting animals, and documenting conditions.
It is not glamorous work. Families can be hesitant to answer questions. Some areas are unsafe or difficult to access. But without this step, clinics risk serving the easiest-to-reach households rather than the animals most at risk of crisis.
Only after that groundwork is complete do permits get requested, locations secured, and logistics coordinated. And even then, plans are fragile. Clinics have been forced to relocate at the last minute, with tents already assembled and supplies unloaded, requiring everything to be dismantled and rebuilt somewhere else.
This is the invisible beginning of prevention.
Spay and neuter surgeries are taking place in the tents as families way.
What Has to Line Up for a Single Clinic Day
On clinic day, the pace shifts. Global Strays coordinators are on-site early, managing the flow of families, supporting veterinarians and technicians, answering questions, and making sure the environment feels orderly and safe.
Many people assume there is a single veterinarian performing surgeries. In reality, as Kathe Rivera, Project Lead explains, “There isn’t just one veterinarian. One evaluates the animal, another manages anesthesia, another performs the surgery, and another stays with them during recovery.”
Animals are assessed carefully before surgery. Anesthesia is monitored closely. Recovery is supervised until each animal is stable enough to return home.
Alongside the medical team are administrative staff managing consent forms, organizing appointment order, and handling logistics such as transportation and supplies. It is coordinated, high-focus work from the first patient to the last.
Some animals arrive sick or injured and cannot be sterilized that day. These cases require additional evaluation, prescriptions, and follow-up recommendations. When families lack the resources to pursue further care, we step in to make sure those animals are not left without options.
Puppy is weighed before her spay procedure.
Vet checks data prior to surgery.
Why These Clinics Can’t Happen Without Support
Clinics at this scale are not self-sustaining.
Many of the families served cannot afford even basic veterinary care. In the communities where we work, even low-cost sterilization is often out of reach. Without sustained outside support, these clinics would simply not happen, or they would exclude the very neighborhoods most affected by overpopulation and abandonment.
When Clinics Are Frequent and Accessible
When clinics arrive consistently and early, the changes are visible.
Unplanned litters are prevented. Puppies and kittens are not born into street conditions. Pregnant dogs are no longer wandering neighborhoods without care.
Maria Fernanda Pacho has been coordinating clinics for us for several years and has seen the changes; she explains, “When we have enough spay and neuter clinics in a neighborhood, you really see the reduction of strays on the street.”
Over time, something deeper shifts as well. Communities begin seeking sterilization proactively. Families ask when the next clinic will return. Local rescuers bring in animals they have been trying to help for months.
This is prevention in practice.
It doesn’t look dramatic. It doesn’t produce viral moments. But it changes the trajectory of suffering before it becomes irreversible.
Beyond Rescue
Rescue will always matter. But rescue alone can never keep pace with the scale of animal suffering.
Spay and neuter clinics, when done early and done well, interrupt that cycle before it begins. They require planning, trust, coordination, and people willing to do hard, unglamorous work long before the first animal arrives.
This is the work Global Strays exists to support.