. . . to be cheesed off at vet prices?

[RedPandaFluff]

I had a premolar extracted last week in preparation for having braces fitted. Total cost of the x-ray and extraction was £145.

Had our cat at the vet today and she needs a tooth removed. They've quoted £950 for the x-ray and tooth extraction.

AIBU to feel a bit ripped-off? The vet said we can phone around but we're unlikely to find a vet who will do it for less than £800! Is this really a reasonable cost? Absolutely prepared to listen and learn why it's so expensive, but it just seems excessive!

These prices are wild. It sounds like a racket.

Trouble is they know people will pay them.

There's a wide racket going on here. A woman I used to know kept on adopting sick dogs that no one else wanted. The dog kennels would ring her up and give her a sob story about this that or the other hopeless case, she'd take it in, obviously couldn't get insurance for it, spend bloody thousands at the vet over the couple of years she had it, it would die, rinse and repeat. Obviously that's quite extreme, but it's part of this wider narrative that in order to demonstrate your love for animals you have to have pets, and you have to pay shit loads of money out for them.

If your cat really needs it I hope you get its tooth sorted OP and for a lot less than you've been quoted. But I would take a step back and wonder if it's really necessary. I mean if it can eat and isn't in pain, is it really a problem?

Exactly.

If you want state of the art medicine, you pay top price. Animal or human.

YANBU, Our dog is diabetic, diagnosed two years ago at the age of 10. He developed cataracts due to the diabetes and lost his sight. He couldn’t adapt so was referred to a specialist ophthalmic vet and he had surgery to remove the cataracts at a cost of £5000 which was thankfully mostly covered by insurance. It was worth doing as he was so depressed when he lost his sight. He now has six monthly eye check ups which take all of 10 minutes, if that, and for that we’re charged £165. I get that it’s a specialist vet but still.

His insulin costs £85 online with a vet prescription (and even though it’s electronic and not a physical prescription it costs £18 for the vet to issue it and send it electronically to the online chemist), if I buy insulin directly from the vet it costs £156. Needles for his Vetpen, the alternative to a syringe, cost £48 from the vet for a box of 100 which lasts 50 days. Yesterday I bought 3 boxes (so 300 needles) from an online chemist and paid £3.88 per box.

When I make an insurance claim I fill in the online Petplan claim form, submit it and get a message saying it’s been passed onto my vet for their information. If I’ve done that within the surgery opening hours I’m guaranteed to get a call within minutes of it arriving in the surgery inbox, asking for payment of £10 for them to fill in their section which must take all of two minutes.

My cat had two teeth extracted a couple of weeks ago £770 and that included 10% discount for being a care plan member. They sent me an itemised breakdown, it was nuts. Aside from the expected GA, xrays, bloods, there were charges for needles, wipes, dressings - if it was used, it was charged. Multiple items costing £10-£20 and it added up quickly.

She's not recovered well, I've had 5 follow up appointments, they cost £18 each plus £20-£30 for each item of medication they give her - pain relief, anti sickness, anti biotics, appetite stimulant.

Thank goodness for insurance, that £20 a month is certainly looking worthwhile now!

I had 2 dogs have around 10 teeth extracted between them last year for around £1200 under GA.

My dog had a blood test and 6 teeth removed for £660 2 weeks ago. I’d be shopping around for a better price!

Removing the skin 'ropes' or rolls from brachy breeds is a welfare thing, saving them from soreness and repeated infection and its much better to do this before that skin gets badly infected. Humans also have reductions in skin that causes folds for the same reasons.

Bitch all you like about vet prices but, you bought a dog with excess skin and rolls/ropes... you should have had the money for that (also eyes, nares and BOAS should be things you prepare for). I have had dogs all my adult life and at no time has general maintenance involved wiping and applying creams to skin rolls!

I would be shopping around. I'm not in the UK, but that sounds very expensive to me. Admittedly it's been a long time since my cat had teeth removed, but it cost $500, and that was for four or five teeth.

It's been really interesting reading through these responses. A couple of people have asked where I'm located - we're in the north west of England. And yes, I do have good (expensive!) insurance but unfortunately dental isn't covered, which seems to be standard for most policies.

And yes, I do know pets are expensive, but I got my cat years and years ago and have paid out (quite happily) hundreds of pounds a year for check ups, vaccinations, flea/worm treatments, minor ailments. It was the huge difference in cost between human dental treatment and animal dental treatment that I was dismayed by, as even with a GA it's such a quick, simple procedure I was curious to know if it's justified.

Unfortunately it has become a racket. The same corporations/ hedge funds that are taking over all the independent vets also have interests in the insurance companies too. The vets that I know are despairing of how the industry is going. I though I’d read the situation has become so bad that even the gov. were going to commission a report on why vets prices have risen so much above inflation. I think we can work out the reason.

@WiddlinDiddlin

Who rattled your cage .
I'm guessing you're American where this may be more common to take off skin , like BOAS surgery is also not common here although mine had this . I have enough money thankyou to do whatever is needed for my dogs but I won't put them through cosmetic procedures just incase something happens .

RedPandaFluff
Glad you said about dental not being covered- pet insurance seems to me to be like every type of insurance, pay monthly and get nothing/ close to nothing back. Yes if something huge happens to our dog/cats hopefully it will do something for us, but in the meantime it’s pay pay pay and still fork out tons of money for walking through the vet’s door.

I’m in the NW. You will find a more reasonably priced practice locally. If you’re close to Liverpool I can give you a couple of recommendations

It's exactly the same as human paracetamol, which my vet told me to give my dog, tailored to her weight.

I've just changed vets for my dog.
( 3 miles away from each other)
Previous vet is all singing dancing swanky huge practice
New vet small family practice
Old vet charged £130 for consultation and repeat medications
New vet charges £52 for the exact same 🤷‍♀️

Last year we paid £400 for our cat to have 2 teeth removed under GA and his follow up care and medicine.

That included x-rays etc. Based in London

My vet used to be a little independent practice with just the owner and one other vet running it. He then retired and the practice was bought out. The prices have now gone up hugely. An appointment is £60 just for the consultation where it used to be £35, a prescription has gone from £10 to £26.

Every time I take my elderly spaniel in the vet wants to try different medication, all involving expensive pre-treatment blood tests. If it wasn’t for the fact that the poor old dog probably won’t be here for much longer I’d definitely move to another practice.

So someone bred a dog who’s skin is so folded and deformed that they are at risk of constant infections, and also one that needs surgical help to breathe (that’s what your later mentioned BOAS surgery is, isn’t it?), and you have knowingly bought that poor dog?
In all my years of dog ownership I have never had to have a “cosmetic” procedure to help them function normally. Not sure your vet is the villain here.
Also, completely irrelevant to the OP, as her cat actually has a medical problem requiring the removal- that’s bad luck, nothing to do with bad human choices.

@Glendaruel totally agree. I've kept my dogs at a vet miles from where I live because of this.

They were my vets when I had horses and they do farm animals too. By far the cheapest vets in the area.

One 5 mins from my house wanted almost double when I asked for a quote.

Shop around and try independent vets. Private equity firms are making a fortune off the back of pet owners. Insurance makes it an easy cow to milk but stings those not covered.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/09/08/mayfair-private-equity-cash-squeeze-pet-owners-new-low/

@feelingalittlehorse

I'm not engaging in discussions about bulldogs it's well known they're vilified on here . The OP was talking about the costs of vets bills and I answered as did others . My bulldog has not had anymore health issues than my others. You are just using an excuse to spout your views about bulldogs which definitely isn't what the OP asked .
I'm not listening .

But then you wouldn't be comparing like with like - because I was comparing prices, and the whole opening post is about price comparison.

The total bill for my dog (just checked the itemised receipt) was nearly all the costs of the GA and other ancillary charges such as post-op prescription pain killers and (optional) bloods.

If it was simply the X-ray and the actual extractions, then £142 - just cheaper than OP's human price.

The question in OP was why the price difference - the answer is the GA

So if OP wants to compare properly, then she either needs to know what she would have been billed privately for the procedure to be done under GA (eg in a private hospital, which has all the kit and the staff trained for this - just like vets do, but are overheads dentists don't have)

Or she needs to look at the itemised bill and compare only the specific parts of the animal procedures

Quite right 👏

Ok, I normally can't be bothered to challenge comments online, I spend enough time explaining costs on a daily basis, however just to explain.

RVN's (registered veterinary nurse) are experienced qualified professionals who are indeed 'specialists' in what they do. Most now enter the profession through the 4 year degree route and many go on to further study in specialist disciplines such as anaesthesia which is a further 2 years study.
Monitoring a patient during surgery isn't really a case of ' Bob's your uncle'. It requires considered concentration, often for several hours, training in specialist monitoring equipment, understanding of abnormal patterns and how to correct them. Certain parts of surgery are more painful than others, anaesthetic depth has to be adjusted throughout. Maintaining homeostasis/thermoregulation etc. Patients have to be monitored from premedicant stage through to recovery which can add an hour on to monitoring time. Post surgery we will regularly pain score our patients and check all their parameters, then take any appropriate action.
I could go on but you get the picture. We are certainly not paid £200 per hour though, not even £200 per day!

As for anaesthetic drug costs. We are not allowed to use cheap generic drugs if there is a species specific licensed alternative, these are often 10 X the cost. Plus there is a huge amount of wastage.

£900 for a single extraction is excessive though. Full mouth x-rays bump up the bill but really are necessary in cats. I would say average is around £500 unless multiple extractions.