The Onychectomizer or Partial Digitalectomy Severance Device

Resco declawing guillotine
Resco declawing guillotine
Two useful tags. Click either to see the articles: Toxic to cats | Dangers to cats

The devices mentioned in the title to this article are made-up words, glamorized versions of the cheap Resco Nail Trimmer.

The Resco Nail Trimmer is probably the most disgusting piece of equipment that an American veterinarian uses but, OMG, he uses it thousands of times. The Resco nail trimmer is possibly the most used item in his arsenal of equipment. It is used to cut off the last phalange of the toe of a cat; of every toe on both forepaws of the cat.

It is, therefore, not a trimmer of a cat’s nail at all. It is the most devious misrepresentation in the veterinarian’s dictionary. Far from trimming the nail of a cat, this nasty device mutilates a cat by amputating the top of a cat’s toes. That means bone and it means cartilage and it does not mean trimming anything.

The made-up description of the declawing device in the title to this post was made by Robert M Miller DVM. He is a cartoonist, speaker and Veterinary Medicine Practitioner Board Member. He is also, in my opinion, a nasty, insensitive, commercially orientated, objectionable, unthinking veterinarian.

He thinks he can joke about the instruments that veterinarians use to mutilate cats for their owner’s convenience. There is no medical benefit in declawing a cat. All the benefit is for the cat’s owner and therefore the process is entirely in breach of the veterinarian’s oath. We all know that except the vet.

The reason why Dr Miller invented these silly made up words was because he was complaining about a quoted $1000 fee by a local veterinarian for declawing a cat. He thought the fee was exorbitant (it is) and therefore he felt obliged to make the equipment, used to carry out the operation, sound exotic to justify the exorbitant fee. Big joke. Ha Ha Ha.

The reason why Dr Miller wrote an article (here is the link) about declawing is because a relative of his wished to declaw their cat. They have an eight-month old neutered male cat. Dr Miller, in his infinite wisdom, says that the entire family had scratch wounds on their hands and while he was there the dog suffered a bloody nose. He suggested declawing their cat’s forepaws. I wish he had suggested something far more wise and sensible, namely how his relatives should handle and care for their cat properly.

Clearly these people haven’t got the first clue how to handle a domestic cat properly and by the sound of it they are getting scratches because of mishandling and because, quite possibly, their cat is stressed and anxious due to a poor environment. If a cat owner gets scratched it is their fault.

However this cartoonist vet, who, incidentally, should stick to cartoons and stop mutilating cats, simply does not see the logic of that simple and far more humane advice. The quick, cheap fix is to mutilate the cat and ignore what the cat’s caretaker can and should do to avoid scratches, which incidentally is extremely easy to do.

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13 thoughts on “The Onychectomizer or Partial Digitalectomy Severance Device”

  1. This is SHOCKING from an ex vet tech who packed in her job because of being forced to participate in declawing:

    ‘This was never intended for use as a surgical instrument and not able to even be autoclaved due to their construction. Some vets (such as the board certified feline specialist I had the misfortune of working for) don’t even bother to change the guillotine blade for every surgery, because a new blade costs a few cents…so lots of times, it might even be *dull* and it’s NEVER sterile’

    I asked her permission to share it without revealing her identity.

    Reply
    • Thanks for publishing this quote, Ruth. It is shocking but in some ways it is not surprising to me bearing in mind the attitude of a veterinarian who does declawing in the 1st place. I will see if I can do an article on this.

      Reply
      • Thanks Michael, it might convince some pro declaws into realising that declawing vets don’t care about cats, only the money they can make from mutilating them.

        Reply
  2. I’ve seen that picture before and it filled me with revulsion then as much as it does now. Its just so cruel and crude! If that was used on a person it would be in the setting of a torture chamber.

    Reply

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