If You Think Your Pet Is Ill...

[midori1999]

WWhatever the time, day or night, vets have an emergency out of hours service. You can speak to and explain symptoms to avet who wil tell you if you need to come in as an emergency or if they need to come out and do a home visit.

It is FAR better to look/feel a bit silly in front of your vet because there really is no 'emergency' than to have a sick, dying or suffering pet. If you thought your child might be sick would you worry about looking silly or would you wait until morning to take them to A&E?

Not getting a sick animal to a vet is neglect, pure and simple. I never gfail to be gobsmakced by teh number of people on various forums that I use that aren't aware their vets have an out of hours service or for whatever reason, best known only to them, are reluctant to visit the vets with their animal.

Valhalla - my ds2 wants to be a vet too......only if he works with otters though!

i dont find standard vets fees high.

buns treatment was £26 for the inital consultation and first jab, then each follow up jab was £8.

have looked in our new pups costs, inc castration, vet insurence etc, and we can afford it.

I get better service from our vets than I do the gp.

If I take a dog with d&v to the vets he is prescribed probiotic paste and special food. If he isn't on the mend within 48 hours they run blood tests and try to pinpoint the problem.

I can't think of a gp who will see a child with d&v let alone prescribe or investigate.

My dog insurance costs £62 a month and our excess is over £70. I am in the process of claiming for £1000 of operations.

You probably get better service because you pay for it

we get a 10% discount if we take all our animals in to be vaccinated together.
Unfotunately the waiting room isn't big enough, I don't have enough hands and the vet charges 10% more than the other vets around so its a bit pointless.
We are apparently 'Gold' members, I think that actually means 'gold spenders' you can see their eyes light up if we go in!

We pay a damn sight more in tax and ni than we do for pet and human health insurance.

Just because it's free at point of use does not mean I havnt paid for it.

fruit, I know just how you feel.

Because I foster dogs (and of course have them treated/vaxed/neutered etc) as well as own 2 of my own, plus cats and a pet ferret, and because I'm known in the area for being the woman who will nurse/care for stray/orphaned/abandoned/sick/injured creatures my vet's computer entry for me has a list of names, species and breeds as long as your arm.

Vets have made a fortune out of me over the years!

This is providing your pet insurance pays up.

Our dog is insured with a quite well known insurance company.
In March we called our vets for a telephone cconsultation on a Saturday as our dog had a very scabby nose.They said that we could take her in but we declined as we had nobody to care for our 2 dd. We took her in on the Tuesday and we was told it could be an auto immune disease and they would give us antibiotics and see if it cleared up..if not she would need a biopsy.
Well 2 weeks ago her nose was getting worse...lost all pigmentation so we took her back.She had the biopsy costing almost 500.
Thevet thinks they may not pay for our claim as we didnt take her in after the first telephone consultation,but we didnt know it would be ongoing treatment then and also the next bill was under the excess so didnt claim.
We are now stuck until end of this week to know if they will pay our bill or we dont know where we wil lget the money from.
You always get told to take out insurance for peace of mind...its just giving us more worry.

Isn't it good that vets say take the animals in to them to check they are alright!

My experience of vets has only ever been positive. They have given us their home number when we had a very sick cat over Christmas and said to call them any time! They have x rayed my dog and charged nothing when they realised that it was terminal for example.

If you have good insurance (yes I know it does need hunting down!) then you can rest assured that you can call out of hours if needed and if you have a good relationship with your vets practice you realise that they will do all that they can for your animals. If they were really in it to make money I think they would have become stock brokers!

I don't understand shanks why they will not pay up you just have to claim for all the treatment from the first telephone consultation.

My vets has been taken over by some massive company and it is £90 just to get an appointment to be seen by an out of hours vet, before treatment. They need payment upfront too. They won't wait for the insurance. During the day will, but not for the out of hours service.

We have an emergency credit card that we could use if some thing major, but I can't afford that if it can wait until morning.

We can't even speak to a vet on the phone. We used to be able to, but not now.

It needs common sense......my pony had colic (on a Saturday night of course) so I didn't hesitate getting the vet out to give him a jab and it did cost a lot, but that's life.

On the other hand, my dog was puking and puking (a lab so therefore a dustbin on legs), but she was drinking and not otherwise distressed so I left it for 12 hours to see if it improved which it did.

We had a sick cat with similar symptoms to his brother (kidney failure) which we took to vet and said we thought it was the same thing. Oh no, they said this is completely different, and wired the poor fellow up, put him on a drip and kept him going for 48 hours, then said, oh it is kidney failure (didn't do any tests) best put him to sleep. My gripe is that we had specifically said we do not want him to suffer and by relying on their advice he did, no question. We complained, and received an apology with the explanation that the younger vets tend to be over cautious and prefer to give an animal every chance. I agree that you don't put them to sleep on a whim, but our cat suffered needlessly for 48 hours, even when we had specifically said we didn't want him to. Some of them seem to be surprised that you don't want to keep the animal alive at all costs, if it means terrible suffering.

My horse is having treatment for something whch is pretty horrendous, and if this treatment fails, or if it works and the problem reappears at a later date the vet and I have come to a decision we can't do it again, it's not fair on the horse. Putting him down will break my heart, but if we can't cure this then his life will entail living in a restricted area and doing nothing but mooching about the small yard - hell for a nosy, busy thoroughbred.

From my very lengthy epistle you will have noticed that this bothers me - sorry if I've bored you!

I had to use the emergency vet last night, when my dog collapsed and fitted. I called and described the symptoms, vet says bring her in NOW, could be bloat. It wasn't - seems it's epilepsy - and the lovely, lovely man wouldn't even take our name and address to send the bill!

My vet's a bit of an arse. Despite having had my two cats registered with him for years (and never having failed to pay promptly for any treatment), he made quite clear all treatment my pup received when she was attacked would need to be paid up front or she would not be treated .

Her leg was practically hanging off (broken in three places + flesh wounds) I had to consider PTS only because of my vets stance.

She is my responsibility, of course but the potential cost of her treatment was likely to be outside of my current means. She was not insured because she was not even of an age where she was able to leave the house and it hadn't occurred to me that she would be attacked while asleep in her own basket.

As it was, a charity stepped in and effectively guarantored her treatment until I was in a position to pay them back. I'll be forever grateful for their compassion and slightly miffed at my vets lack of it.

I'm always a bit confused by the stance of people who say their vet charged them lots when they didn't find anything wrong, or can't understand why a fractured pelvis can cost several thousand pounds to repair. When an animal is presented to a vet there is an inherent assumption that the client wishes the animal to be diagnosed and treated. Of course in some situations the nature of the condition or the potential cost of treatment may affect the decision-making process and in these cases the client should obviously be engaged in discussion before a course of action is decided upon. In some cases these lines of communication aren't as clear as they should be and that's what leads to problems with costs and failure to meet expectations. Because we're fortunate to enjoy free healthcare in this country most people haven't a clue what healthcare costs. They also expect extremely high standards, and have no grasp of the enormous capital costs faced in running a veterinary practice. Vets are not omniscient, nor can we work miracles for tiny amounts of money. What's more, most of the vets you see in your consultations are assistants and as such have nothing to gain directly from your bill being huge. Yes, there will be the odd rogue who causes the rest of us to get a bad name. But I'm really proud of my profession - some may say we're the only truly 24 hour profession left.

Thankyou for posting that OhExpletive. I have huge respect for veterinary science and those who study it in order best to help our animals. Please don't misunderstand me.

I think you are right that the cost of some aspects of vet treatment is a mystery to most of the public, and that's perhaps why it scares some of us.

I hope this doesn't sound daft, but would it not be pertinent to introduce some kind of sliding scale for charges, depending on income? Many other caring professions for instance psychotherapy and dentistry operate in this way. It might encourage people to bring in their sick animals rather than risk their lives because of prohibitive costs.

I would also just like to add that the cost of NHS healthcare for humans is also mainly a mystery, but I am aware of some prices...such as the prescription I had recently, which practically saved my sanity but had a net cost to the NHS was £1.88

I don't pay for prescriptions, but if I did I'd have paid a fiver I think. And two years ago I'd have paid £5 for a course of something else, which was absolutely required, and I happen to know cost the NHS more like £88.

It's interesting stuff.

Here here OhExpletive. People expect high standards of care but are not always willing to pay for them. It is an ongoing source of frustration to many vets who just want to do the best by the animal but end up having to make decisions based around money. They are not always the choices anyone would prefer. For example we have a cat at the moment with a severely injured leg. The owners are now considering the options open to them as to how to treat this cat. Should we do the expensive option and surgically fix it, should we do the cheaper option and amputate the leg? The cat is young and would have a reasonable quality of life on 3 legs, or do we do the cheapest option and euthanase the poor cat? Depending how you look at this we are being good to the cat and the owners in giving them choice, or we are being money grabbing and using their emotions to make them feel awful for not choosing the best option. Our role is not to judge but to do the best we can under whatever the circumstances and ultimately it is the owners choice what happens here. Yes we will offer them some sort of payment scheme too to help them if they want, but having said that, there is no obligation for vets to do this, they do so out of kindness. If you knew how many people default on such schemes you can see why many vets are moving away from it, preferring instead to rely on people having the sense to have funds available for emergencies, or to have insurance to cover costs.

Flightattendant - there is no governing body that regulates veterinary fees. It is up to the individual practice what is charged and many practices do a voluntary reduction in fees for individual cases to try and help people out. Veterinary standards however are governed by the RVCS.

I had a feeling that vets fees are unregulated.
It would be better for everyone if they were and there was some scale in place.
Are private dentists??

I can see your problem there BG.

As Sharbie says perhaps fee regulation would be a good thing.

There are several practices in our town. One charges a lower fee and has been prosecuted in the last for helping people claim insurance fraudulently. Not condoning this but I know the guy and think he meant just to be kind and ensure that animals were treated even if people couldn't afford the fees.

The one we go to charges far more than all the others and I suppose it either goes into extensive facilities or into a healthy profit...who knows.

we have had problems in the past though where they have gone ahead with expensive tests without consent, and then sought to charge for these when my family would not have chosen to have them done.

People generally know when they or their child is ill. With an animal, most of us are ignorant. So we never know if we will be looking at an expensive bill or not, and there aren't that many families who could easily save up a spare £6,000 in case of an emergency...if the insurance is generous you might be alright but so many companies seek only to profit it would seem and exclude many, many things - jabs aren't covered, flea and worm stuff isn't, recurrent conditions (I was told if my cat had 'had something before' they wouldn't pay even if it wasn't an ongoing thing, just a second episode)
it all became less than worthwhile to do and I spent the year's insurance premium on her treatment instead.

Vets are a business. Most people have a choice of vets, if you don't like the fees or policies of one, take your business elsewhere. I don't see the need for fees to be regulated.

But the fees are all very similar.

Insurance companies are also a business, and again, if you don't like the fees and policies, go elsewhere. The trouble is, all insurance (not just for pets) is equal and people often look for the cheapest policies without checking what they cover.

Vaccinations, worming, neutering etyc are normal expenses of pet owning, ones that can be planned for and expected. Insurance is to cover the unexpected, surely? Would you expect your house insurance to pay for the outside of your house to be painted every so often, or your double glazing to be replaced after wear and tear?

No, Midori, of course not - that wasn't my point. I mentioned those things as they still need to be paid for and are not cheap.

I did used to insure faithfully every year but when it transpired they wouldn't consider any condition she had previously had - even year ago - it seemed so bloody pointless I just gave up.

Your animal is only allowed to have cystitis once, apparently or it is 'pre-existing'. To me that is nonsense.

it's like saying you can only have one burglary or fire at your house, any more than that and tough.

IMO all types of insurance are a rip off and a licence to print money/charge extortionate fees.Made even worse when they find all types of reasons not to pay claims.

Not all insurance policys are the same though. If you have a read of some of the insurance policy threads here you will see often that "cover for life" policys are recommended. These do cost more than many policys but they do guarantee that if your pet develops a problems that is recurrent or ongoing they will continue to provide ongoing cover and no exclusion for that problem up to an annual limit which is then reset to £0 each year provided your renew the policy on time. The only time they would exclude things is if they existed prior to the policy being taken out in the first place, or for the few things that are written in the policy terms and conditions such as routine dental cleaning (this does not mean all dental things are excluded BTW, but read each policy carefully). I am the first to agree there are some terrible "rip off" insurance policys for pet health, but I also believe there are some good policys out there too.

For what it is worth I have my puppy insured with petplan. I am a vet. I think that says a lot about my belief in pet insurance, bearing in mind I can do a lot of health care for my pet at a reduced price in the first place. (Petplan do not give me free cover or other incentives to promote their policies BTW! - and there are other good insurers out there too.)