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Sunday 25 August 2013

And I thought that........

Private dentistry was expensive. They're just amateurs.

Vets beat them hands down.

A friend of mine yesterday contacted her vet, on advice from me, as her old cat was showing extreme distress. The poor animal was just lying on it's side in the front doorstep in the pouring rain. This was the same symptoms as an old cat of mine had suffered two years ago so I know what she should expect. The poor creature was dying.

Now my dentist charges me £50 for a half hour session, the Butcher of Belsen Hygienist charges £45, you would think that those altruistic vets who have dedicated themselves to saving fluffy bunnies and the like would charge less.

You would be utterly wrong in that assumption.

My friend was quoted £300 quid!

As mentioned above I've been through this and know that from the time you arrive at the vet, till the time you leaving tearfully carrying the body of a trusting, small, lifeless animal, is only at the most, fifteen minutes.

The cost my friend was quoted was £230 for an examination and £70 for the lethal injection.

FFS. That means that the vet is charging £230 x 4 = £920 per sodding hour.

How on earth can anyone possibly justify these sort of charges?

I now consider vets as in the same league as payday loan companies.

11 comments:

  1. Tell the vet, after you strap him down to the table and the lethal dose of barbiturate begins to flow into his vein, that you won't be charging him for this service.

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    Replies
    1. I'd charge him for the barbiturate though, only my time would be free.

      Delete
  2. By contrast. The wife had the vet out for one of her horses. Bear in mind he had to drive about 80 miles for the round trip.
    Cost for that in SA R2,500-00 GBP 166-00 which included the drugs needed for a week.
    Your lot are thieves.
    Chris Templer
    South Africa

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  3. Our 3 legged cat had to be put down about 4 years ago, he was 17, we knew he was on the way out and went to our vets 7 day operation in the next town over from us, Halifax, as it was a Sunday. It cost less than £100 which included the examination, (liver failure), a pain killer and then the main jab. All handled very sympathetically.
    The same vets practice removed his leg 16.1/2 years ago, (we think he was hit by a car) it cost about £100 then for the exam and xrays then only £30 to have the leg removed. Worst part was his pulling at the stitches, twang twang twang!

    Daedalus

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    Replies
    1. My brothers cat, was kidnapped by the vet for four days at an outrageous rate for overnight accommodation.

      I took our cat to the vet as it seems to have lost the use of the last two thirds of it's tail. Consult £60
      proposed scan £280.

      'fraid the cat didn't get the scan.

      City vets are thieves preying on the emotions of gullible city populations. I used to live near a farm, if the farm cat had too many kittens, the excess would take a trip to the river in a sack, and not come back.

      Delete
  4. Anyone dealing with UK vets these days is in for a big surprise and the rot set in some time ago... on a Sunday afternoon in 2005 whilst exercising our dog in a park chasing a frisbee she missed and bit down on her tongue. It wouldn't stop bleeding and appeared to me to need a stitch. So... off to the vet... this involved a call out since none of the surgeries in the chain were actually manned on Sundays. We arrived at the vets with the dog still dripping blood... The vet took one look at her tongue and pronounced that 'it will stop bleeding eventually' and that no treatment as such was necessary. £35 call out fee and £75 for the consultation. We were in and out of the surgery in under 5 minutes...
    My wife currently lives in England and about a year took sole charge of an abandoned Spanish street dog, a little Chihuahua cross, Sophie, that we had jointly raised from a puppy when she lived out here in Spain. Whilst walking the dog in a local park in Southsea Sophie appeared to have been stung on one of her front legs. Nothing serious and initially very quickly forgotten, but over the course of the next few days she began to pay a lot of attention to the wound site, biting and licking it and making it look very sore. Wifey claimed that she could both see and feel a stinger or something similar still in-situ, but Sophie wouldn't let her investigate. In desperation she took the dog to a vet... where a very hoity toity 'Im trained for this, what would you know' female vet gave a cursory glance at the wound site, and administered an antibiotics shot, an antinflammatory shot, and a steroids shot and sent my wife on her way with a second appointment for three days time... and a bill for £85. The second appointment went the same way as the first, no detailed examination despite the fact that the dogs had chewed the wound site completely bare of fur. More jabs, and another £85 bill. At this point the vet started making comments about the possibility of this being a case of Cutaneous Leishmaniasis, a rather nasty Mediterranean animal disease. She freely admitted not knowing much about the condition but had latched onto the fact that this was an ex Spanish dog.
    Here in Spain we have rescued a dozen street dogs some of whom are still with us, some of whom we have rehomed. We know about Leish in both its variant forms and other Mediterranean diseases. The vet however would not listen and set a date for yet another appointment in two weeks time that would entail anaesthesia and a skin scrape for a biopsy... It was at about this time that I paid a visit back to the UK. Now Sophie hadn't seen me for over a year but once she got over her initial hostility she settled onto my lap and let me stroke her... I found the cause of the problem... it wasn't a sting but a sharp grass seed that had buried itself deeply in her skin. With a pair of tweezers, I managed to remove it completely. With much protesting from Sophie I dumped her in the kitchen sink and gently bathed the area and applied some gauze and surgical tape... Within a week the wound had healed up and new fur was growing... £170 wasted... I have very little faith in UK vets...
    I spend my life literally surrounded by dogs 24/7/365, they live with me, eat with me and even sleep with me. When I leave them on their own it's the end of the world so far as they are concerned. At least 4 of the current pack members would have definitely died had I not stepped in, all were 'abandonados' dumped by uncaring owners just left to starve to death or to be the victim of a road accident.
    My Spanish vet is completely different; I asked him recently what would be the total cost for Rabies renewal shots for 7 dogs, microchipping for 4, passport preparation for 4. and worming tabs for all... the bottom line... 160€... OK he knows that my lot are all rescues but even so his charges are far more in line with the real costs rather than some imaginary figure as charged in the UK...

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  5. Yes, it is a rip off. But at least they do actually put the poor thing out of its misery.

    The medical profession on the other hand charge even more to ensure that people continue to suffer.

    And I hate to say it, but your dentist seems cheap compared to mine!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. He's cheap for yearly inspections. However for actual work, not so.

      Delete
  6. Last year my cat (who was very old) got very breathless one Saturday evening, and was quite distressed. I called the vet, and he told me to bring her to his surgery in town at 10pm. He opened up for us, examined her, gave her an antibiotic shot, an immune system booster shot, a vitamin shot and gave us some high-energy multi-vit paste to give to her daily. The cost for all that after dragging him out at ten o'clock on a Saturday night? €45. The UK is a complete rip-off for veterinary services. I remember well being outraged several times when I lived there.

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  7. While a student, I once bought an edition of Punch to read on my way home for Christmas. It was the issue that contained their "legal terms glossary" and I think vets should be put on the same level as QC's. Punch defined "taking silk" as "much like taking lead from church roofs but more profitable".

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  8. so what are you waiting for - you know now how to get rich

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