Vet Expenses Causing Problems for Pet Owners

[easyrider]

Today we spent several hours dealing with a client over scheduling a simple recheck exam on a dog who is doing very well post-op, exceeding expectations.

The deal is the dog is from Atlanta and three weeks ago needed emergency spinal surgery. The owner elected to drive 2 hours to our hospital because we are much less expensive than private specialty hospitals in Atlanta and we are even less expensive than the teaching hospital at the University of Georgia. We are less expensive because we need to serve the people of Alabama (whose tax dollars support us), and we need to be priced accordingly. So this owner gamed the system- took advantage of Alabama prices but does not contribute tax dollars to support our hospital. HER CHOICE to travel to a less convenient location to have her dog's surgery done.

At the time of discharge, she was told to schedule a recheck exam for 2-3 weeks in the future. She did not schedule and called at the last minute to book a recheck appointment but there were none available.

We normally recheck these dogs at 3 weeks and 6 weeks and its common for people that have driven very far (like 5-7 hr) that the 3 week recheck will take place with their regular vet at home if all if well. We suggested that. Owner rejected this. We suggested she send us a video of the dog's gait and we could discuss over the phone. Owner rejected this. Then she claimed that dog was actually not doing well. We suggested bringing him in through our emergency room. Owner rejected that. Owner threatened to take the dog to see a closer neurologist- we advised that was fine. In the meantime, a client called to cancel her recheck for Wednesday- so we offered that to this owner. She rejected that. She is only available to come on Thursday. Which is a day that we don't see rechecks at all, due to the typical ebb and flow of emergencies.

Next she threatened to call the dean.

And finally she called back and scheduled the Wednesday recheck but is very bitter about it because she will have to call out sick from work to make it to a 15 minute recheck exam.

HOURS of interaction with this woman over scheduling a simple recheck exam when it was HER CHOICE to travel out of state to save money on her dog's surgery and now she is irate because she has to take a day off from work to make it to a recheck exam. Which she is absolutely welcome to forgo, and we will help her over the phone.

This type of behavior is not just annoying- it requires extra staff when the simplest thing ties up so much time. Drives up costs for everybody. Because the mindset is of having one's cake and eating it too.

Some customers can be such whiny joy suckers.

Bill

 

[JudyH]

I am with the conservative group here. I love all animals. If I could have passed math and chemistry I would have been a vet. I wasn’t allowed to have any pets growing up. I wouldn’t even date a guy that didn’t like animals.
When DH and married, we had a house with pets, and two years later a farm with horses, dogs, and cats for 45 years. Many of them are buried in the back pasture. I used the local vets who lived and worked in the community, we were all on a first name basis.
I must have had 50 barn cats over the years. I learned to give all their injections and vaccinations. Every two years we rounded them up for rabies shots at a vet clinic. They all got cheap canned food. They were all spayed or neutered.
These cats were never sick. They may have been hurt, or injured but never sick. My decision was whether it was less money to put them down or treat them.
Same with the dogs. Maybe mutts back then were just healthier.
Only horses had their teeth done and that was less than $100.
Our only pets now are two 14 yr old brother kitties. It’s been hard to find a local vet here that’s not part of a corporation.
One of them was sick last month for the first time ever. The vet x rayed him, couldn’t tell what it was, we did a trial of some Zofran and other pills for a week and he’s been back to normal.
The vet said the next would be scans or ultrasounds not at his place but an expensive place. I’m not spending thousands just to see and end up putting him down. And he said his teeth were terrible. Well, he eats, he crunches, he doesn’t drool and currently acts normal and eats and poops. Not spending $$ on the teeth unless they were causing a problem and at 14, probably not.
What I do spend on them is $25 per day to their “other mother” my fabulous cat sitter who keeps them at her house when we are away or when my kids come here. I probably pay her several thousand a year and she takes care of them like I do and they love her.

 

[Superchief]

Of course, there are multiple factors and all are true in to some extent. I know for us, our love for pets and, both, our willingness and ability, to pay more for pet care has evolved greatly over the past 30-40 years. We were a young married couple from a rural background and the only purpose for having pets was to perform some kind of service around the house or on the farm. When they could no longer do that, they were replaced. Those animals were almost always kept outside.

Over the years, we moved to urban and suburban living, as did millions and millions of us boomers, and we no longer needed animals to perform those services for us. But, the kids had friends and they wanted pets and we started keeping those pets inside with us because they were safer from danger and contagious diseases. Our feelings for them grew stronger and that has continued, at least in our experience, to the point that we treat them, and love them, as if they are young children. We don’t want them to be sick or feel pain. When they do, we do what we can to make them as comfortable as possible. Instead of thinking and feeling that “they are only animals”, we now think, “they are animals, who feel sickness and pain, just like we do and we want to heal them, not kill them, if possible. Of course, the time comes when we can’t do any more for them, either for our own financial reasons or because it isn’t medically possible. When that time comes, we feel like we have lost a member of our family. Because we have.

We grew up with dogs but my dad always got bird dogs (primarily setters). However, we also treated them as pets and they lived inside and were family members. As an adult, we didn't get a dog until we had a yard that could have a fence so they could play outside. They were never allowed on furniture, but that changed when we had children. We now own three rescued pits who are loving family members and sleep with us. Puppy (our 10 yr old perpetual puppy like Peter Pan) recently became very ill. We took him to both of our regular vets but eventually had to take him to one of only two vet hospitals in the area. They ran several tests and couldn't figure out what caused his problems. They finally identified a problem with his immune system and gave him a blood transfusion and kept him overnight. Fortunately, he started to recover but had to take several medications and required multiple follow-up testing and appointments. The tests were very expensive and we've probably spent almost $10k to get him better. If early testing had shown it would cost $10k to treat his ailment, we would have likely stopped treatments. However, we kept holding out hope that he would get better and the costs add up quickly. He is the sweetest dog we've ever own and has always been the 'greeter' who follows us around and loves everyone. He is currently doing much better and is back to his normal self, but we don't know if he has an underlying condition that could cause him to get sick again.

He is the dog on the left below.

 

[geist1223]

Until I started volunteering at the Oregon Humane Society I never realized how family oriented and friendly were most Pitt Bulls. They are about my favorite breed at the Humane Society.

 

[Superchief]

Until I started volunteering at the Oregon Humane Society I never realized how family oriented and friendly were most Pitt Bulls. They are about my favorite breed at the Humane Society.

Pitt Bulls are similar to other breeds in that most are great pets if they have have loving, responsible owners. They are very affectionate and want to always be close to you, including sitting on your lap. That is probably why the ones that are kept outside on chains become very mean. They do require extra care when around other dogs because they are so powerful and oblivious to pain. Ours have never gone after other dogs, but will defend themselves if attacked. Our 85 lb female (in front in the picture) loves squirrels and actually saved two baby squirrels by carrying them to us after she found them abandoned under a tree in our yard.

 

[wackymother]

We just adopted a stray kitten that turned up in our yard, all alone. We really tried to find it a good home, but after three promising homes fell through, we realized the cat distribution system was doing its work once again.

We have a two-year-old dog that we got as a puppy, and we had another dog before that, so we have a good vet. Took the kitten off to the vet, first checkup, all looks pretty good, kitten is just 6 or 7 weeks old. Of course everyone made a big fuss over this teensy adorable kitten. At one point the tech took the kitten out of the exam room to check something, and she said, "Do you want me to clip his claws too?" I was like, oh, thank you so much, that would be great, they're like razors.

The vet took a lot of time with us, explaining how to introduce the kitten to our dog. When we left, I handed over my credit card to pay the $288 bill. It seemed reasonable for the amount of time and attention the vet had given us. But when we got home--I realized there was a line item of $24 for the claw clipping! Okay, that's a lot, and the tech had never mentioned that it would be that much, or in fact that there would be any charge at all. (My husband can clip a cat's claws!) I wrote them an email and complained. They called back and they're giving us a credit for the $24 bc the tech did not tell us there would be a charge.

This is the first time we've ever complained about any charge with them, bc generally I think they're quite transparent and reasonable about prices. I feel pretty confident that in the past they've done little fix-ups on our dogs at no charge (like clipping a little fur that was getting in one dog's eyes, maybe even clipping claws).

 

[Rolltydr]

We just adopted a stray kitten that turned up in our yard, all alone. We really tried to find it a good home, but after three promising homes fell through, we realized the cat distribution system was doing its work once again.

We have a two-year-old dog that we got as a puppy, and we had another dog before that, so we have a good vet. Took the kitten off to the vet, first checkup, all looks pretty good, kitten is just 6 or 7 weeks old. Of course everyone made a big fuss over this teensy adorable kitten. At one point the tech took the kitten out of the exam room to check something, and she said, "Do you want me to clip his claws too?" I was like, oh, thank you so much, that would be great, they're like razors.

The vet took a lot of time with us, explaining how to introduce the kitten to our dog. When we left, I handed over my credit card to pay the $288 bill. It seemed reasonable for the amount of time and attention the vet had given us. But when we got home--I realized there was a line item of $24 for the claw clipping! Okay, that's a lot, and the tech had never mentioned that it would be that much, or in fact that there would be any charge at all. (My husband can clip a cat's claws!) I wrote them an email and complained. They called back and they're giving us a credit for the $24 bc the tech did not tell us there would be a charge.

This is the first time we've ever complained about any charge with them, bc generally I think they're quite transparent and reasonable about prices. I feel pretty confident that in the past they've done little fix-ups on our dogs at no charge (like clipping a little fur that was getting in one dog's eyes, maybe even clipping claws).

I hadn't really thought about it much because before we moved to Florida we had used the same vet for years. He had a small practice, just him and one other vet that worked there part-time. Unless there was testing or medical procedures, I don't think they told us the cost and we rarely asked. I've noticed here, and especially, with the vet clinic we're using now, they make sure to tell you all the costs upfront. The vet tech takes you back to the exam room, gets all the info they need, discusses with vet if they need to, and tell you the line-item cost prior to doing anything with the pet. Unless I have a sick or injured pet, I'd prefer they just go ahead and do the scheduled services before telling me the cost, but I'm probably in the minority on that.

 

[Superchief]

We just adopted a stray kitten that turned up in our yard, all alone. We really tried to find it a good home, but after three promising homes fell through, we realized the cat distribution system was doing its work once again.

We have a two-year-old dog that we got as a puppy, and we had another dog before that, so we have a good vet. Took the kitten off to the vet, first checkup, all looks pretty good, kitten is just 6 or 7 weeks old. Of course everyone made a big fuss over this teensy adorable kitten. At one point the tech took the kitten out of the exam room to check something, and she said, "Do you want me to clip his claws too?" I was like, oh, thank you so much, that would be great, they're like razors.

The vet took a lot of time with us, explaining how to introduce the kitten to our dog. When we left, I handed over my credit card to pay the $288 bill. It seemed reasonable for the amount of time and attention the vet had given us. But when we got home--I realized there was a line item of $24 for the claw clipping! Okay, that's a lot, and the tech had never mentioned that it would be that much, or in fact that there would be any charge at all. (My husband can clip a cat's claws!) I wrote them an email and complained. They called back and they're giving us a credit for the $24 bc the tech did not tell us there would be a charge.

This is the first time we've ever complained about any charge with them, bc generally I think they're quite transparent and reasonable about prices. I feel pretty confident that in the past they've done little fix-ups on our dogs at no charge (like clipping a little fur that was getting in one dog's eyes, maybe even clipping claws).

Our worst vet experience was with our 20+ yr old cat who was going downhill fast. Our daughter took he to the vet because she was having convulsions. When she got there, the cat stopped breathing so the vet asked her if she wanted the vet to try to revive her. Of course my emotional daughter said yes, so the vet did it. However, after a short time it was obvious the cat was suffering so the vet recommended putting it to sleep. Afterwards, we received a $600 vet bill for reviving her and then putting her to sleep. We never went back to that vet.

 

[Patri]

Update on teeth cleaning for my senior dog. They didn’t mention that the $1200 estimate was worst case scenario. (The advance bloodwork was extra.)
Procedure was yesterday, and only $575. Happy dance. The vet did pull five teeth, due to mobility and bone loss. They were smaller ones. So there is value in getting dental care too.

 

[Superchief]

Update on teeth cleaning for my senior dog. They didn’t mention that the $1200 estimate was worst case scenario. (The advance bloodwork was extra.)
Procedure was yesterday, and only $575. Happy dance. The vet did pull five teeth, due to mobility and bone loss. They were smaller ones. So there is value in getting dental care too.

I wish we could take our dogs to your vet. All of the vets in our area charge $1000+ for this, in addition to the $300 for bloodwork. The lab work is very expensive here because one company has a monopoly. Pet prescription costs are also out of control. It costs over $50 per pill for most flea and tick prevention products. It costs us $150 per month for our three dogs just for this.

 

[geist1223]

I have noticed when a Medicine is labeled Dog/Cat it's costs is higher than the same Medicine for Humans.