The younger Cat that owns this house has a problem with her coat. She moults for Queen and Country. Her fur ends up in a knotted mass and this young female has a rabid dislike of being brushed, combed, and generally handled.
Mrs FE had the bright idea of suggesting the local vetinary practice could take the pain and sort out the coat. (if you’ve ever been scratched by a demented cat, then you’ll know the pain).
So I took the bloody scrounging animal into the vet this morning, sat there for half an hour, and eventually managed to hand over the criminal for incarceration and a fur entanglement procedure.
Phone rings in the afternoon. “Can you pick up your cat”. OK I’ll do that.
If I’d known that they had to drug said cat, just to brush out the lumps of fur, I would have taken another course of action.
Why did they have to charge me £124 for an anaesthetic when I could have rendered the creature from hell, unconscious with a brick?
They’re worse than the dentistry profession.
Regretably the answer is...'because they can.' Many years ago,whilst playing chase the stick, one of my dogs bit right through her tongue causing her a little grief but at the same time causing us a lot of grief because it wouldn't stop bleeding and she was leaving bloody splodges all over a nearly new oatmeal coloured suite and carpet. After 30 minutes of cleaning up, in desperation I called the vet. It was a Sunday and the surgery opened only on call. I arrived about the same time he did... after opening up, he examined her tongue and said... "Well it seems to have stopped... she is OK... it doesn't need any treatment." His fee? £55, 30 quid call-out fee and 25 quid for the 30 second consultation.
ReplyDeleteFound this... seems appropriate...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v13/foxbat/imagesu-haz-lied-to-me-1.jpg
Further to my earlier comment, I have to say that when we moved to Spain five years ago, we contacted a local vet on the outskirts of Granada. We have found the vets at this surgery to be very competent and cheap.
ReplyDeleteFor example Rabies shots here are mandatory annually for all domestic animals the cost is just 10€.
The complete set of annual injections for a newly presented animal,including micro-chipping is just 55€.
We find ourselves regularly adopting street dogs (currently we have 7 in addition to our two Brit dogs) and to comply with Spanish regs all have to have vaccinations and be microchipped.
To take an 'abandonado' off the street and get all of the legal requirements and treatments for the issue of a European Pet Passport costs just 60€.
A Spay op for a female dog is 120€ and 60€ for a male.
When we had our original two Brit dogs prepared in England for a Pet Passport our UK vets charges totaled over £300.
I'm not suggesting that all Spanish vets are this cheap; I haven't checked with others.
Given that both UK Dentists & Vets seem to get away with such bare-faced robbery ..
ReplyDeleteIt is with some degree of comfort to note that amongst all the professions ..
Those two have the highest suicide rates ..
I suppose there must be a God, after all .. ;)
Just read this out to Dear Lady Wife, her response? 'I think it's you writing that stuff when I'm not about!'. Her reason for saying that may have had something to do with the episode, years ago when the Jack Russell that we had inherited, assaulted a passing Alsatian one morning. Ended up missing about three square inches of the skin off it's back. Phoned vet for a house call, not available until late afternoon, and I couldn't leave it that long. So dug out some needles, fishing line, sulphanamide tablets and calf de horning anaesthetic. Injected dog with anaesthetic, wore hedging gloves while doing this, washed wound, packed with powdered sulphanamide, and sewed up.
ReplyDeleteDog chewed its own stitches out about a week later. On a subsequent visit, dog jumped onto vets lap. I asked if he could feel the join, 'no, why?' told him the story. 'Bugger' says he '50 quid I missed out on!
Ever tried extracting porcupine quills from the face of a somewhat tame cheetah? With only a pair of pliers and some leather gauntlets?
ReplyDeleteI have and I still bear the scars, the most obvious being the one which goes right along my hair-line!
If you think that's expensive, wait till you see how much doctors charge! Oh wait, the taxpayer pays for that....
ReplyDelete@ selsey.steve ..
ReplyDeleteNo, but I have, with a large dose of trepidation, petted & stroked a semi-tame Cheetah whilst on a visit to S.Africa, many years ago (got the photos to prove it too).. ;)
Your experience takes more bottle than I've got ..
"just to brush out lumps of fur" well if it was that easy why didn't you do it?
ReplyDelete