The cost of vets

red_bertie

However you need to be able to prove that the vet harmed your animal in someway.

For the average person, very, very hard to do, also, like doctors, there is a 'closed rank' unwritten rule.

Mrs_pbradley936

I think that vets ought to be taught a little bit of business studies alongside whatever else they learn. Several years ago I used to run a livery yard and one day the senior partner came out on a call (I had known him for years) and over tea and a bacon sandwich was telling me about the latest member of his staff. The chap recently qualified had neutered a cat. Everything was perfect no problems at all with the cat, the owner or the vet. However there was a massive problem with the billing because he has earned the practice say £40 which is what the owner was charged BUT he had cost the practice more than that by the amount of tests he had ordered. When questioned he said that at university they always carried out all of these tests and someone had to explain that in the real world you did not! If you carried all the tests you could think of on a cat you were about to neuter your prices would compare unfavourably to the practice down the road who was not carrying out unwarranted tests. I suppose your experience would be the only thing to guide you when assessing what tests an apparently healthy kitten needed.

snowman2_2

lisa2905 wrote: »

Well looking at their cars and personal plates in the car park at my vets and the referral vets I went to they don't do too bad !!!

I drive a 9 year old car with normal plates, my wife's car is 5 years old so I guess I must be doing something wrong!:p

I have seen copies of bills for like for like treatments - insured always comes higher and this is why we owners have had hiked premiums from insurance providers.

Our bills are always the same whether you are insured or not.

Sorry to have a little rant but we are not all bad. How about we set up a campaign to get rid of the bad vets who charge excessively. Simple campaign, change vets to a decent one and stick by them. Look after the good vets, leave the bad vets and we will all do a lot better. Just off for a quick beer to calm down since I am not on call. I just get upset with generalisations when some of us are trying our best to be fair to everyone.:beer:

orlao

Mrs_pbradley936 wrote: »

I think that vets ought to be taught a little bit of business studies alongside whatever else they learn.

I couldn't agree more!!!!

As I've said in this thread I'm sure the very great majority of vet practices have our pets best interests at heart for which I'm truly grateful:D
I started this thread after a very interesting chat with the senior partner at the small animal vets I use where he said he couldn't get anywhere near online prices for meds as he used the med sales mark up to keep consultation fees low and I wondered was that good business practice hence the poll as that meant with so many people using online pharmacies that his profit margin was taking a hit. That, to me, is a bad business model and not any comment on the quality of care that the animals get. In saying that, there is one vet at that practice I avoid if at all possible as she gets very cross if you ask any questions about the treatment and accuses you of not caring for your animals and the senior partner IMHO has a tendancy to carry on for longer than the animal needs IYSWIM as he hates having to PTS anything.
I also wish that they had out sourced their out of hours service to anyone but the "24 hour people" who are rip off merchants IMO.
But overall I wouldn't go anywhere else......

Snowman2

Enjoy your beer:beer: I'm sure you've earned it!!!!
I would love to see a "vet rating" but not sure how you go about it....and yes I've changed vets before now because of the lack of service and would advise anyone to do so.

Stephvetnurse

I take your point about insurance but most people ( unless they read this site) are not aware of the differences between various policies until too late.
Online pharmacies have to have a vet supervising dispensing don't they? Obviously they don't have the overheads of a surgery but they don't have the income from consultations, surgeries etc......

lisa2905

There is good and bad in all professions, and totally agree with a recommendations campaign. I was not generalising the whole profession just giving my experiences with the 2 local vets I visited. The best vet I saw was a lovely professional vet covering (for leave) at my local practice 12 months ago she was fantastic took her time with my dogs diagnosis and probably saved his life !!! Unfortunately Lancashire is too far for me to visit with my dog, but if anyone has any recommendations in the Coventry/Solihull area please tell me more.

wuno

chartreuse wrote: »

I'm sure that the vets in this thread are caring, decent people. But this bad business model seems to be not only widespread, but endorsed by the guild. And I worry about how much influence their guild has, over practitioners in general.

If by "bad business model" you mean 50% markup on drugs, so that they tend to subsidise professional fees, then I would say it is not just widespread, but almost universal. And has been so for years.

You are in a large minority if you buy prescription drugs online. The vast majority of clients buy from their vet. My view is that the "bad business model" holds out very well, and if it ain't broke, why try and fix it?

And as to the influence of the "guild", there is no such thing. The RCVS is there to ensure professional standards and keep a register of vets (and nurses), they don't make any comment about how we run our businesses.

If however, you feel you have been lied to by a vet (re. a prescription being required for a "specialist veterinary diet" - which are available online as the online suppliers have an account with a veterinary wholesaler) or have been prescribed inappropriate medication because of a clinical error, or worse, so that someone could make money out of you, then the RCVS is the place to complain. Each of these would be issues of professional conduct and/or competance.

As to vets standing up for vets, well, that's human nature, but you don't need another vet to support your case to get it heard by the RCVS - they look at the evidence from their own, expert, standpoint.

And vets have been struck off for inappropriate prescribing, carrying out diagnostic tests that are not required, and overcharging on insurance claims. So the system does work.

Mrs_pbradley936

wuno wrote: »

I The vast majority of clients buy from their vet. My view is that the "bad business model" holds out very well, and if it ain't broke, why try and fix it?

How long have vets been prescribing as opposed to dispensing medicines? I don't think I have ever gone to a chemist or bought drugs for a pet on line. Although as I said earlier I would look into it if I was facing a bill for years to come.

We did once have a dog (more than 20 years ago) that had something wrong with its pancreas and we used to have to open capsules to put on its food. We bought them in the chemist but did not need a prescription so perhaps they were not "drugs" but supplements. Also I had a female dog that had a litter and was bleeding badly, she had a blood test and the vet told us to buy iron and vitamin K from Boots (he did not have any). She was tested a few days later and was back to near normal and we stopped giving them to her after about a fortnight. Again perhaps these were not "drugs".

snowman2_2

Supplements you can buy anywhere and prescriptions have been available for a long time, just not for free as they have been for the last 2years 8 months. There are still plenty of drugs that I use that are human, not animal as there is no animal equivalent available. I will write a prescription or if it is available over the counter, suggest someone goes to the local chemist.

Our business studies training was about an hour on a wet tuesday at vet school when we didn't have any appointments or cases in. It taught us the price of syringes etc but not really how to run a business

stephvetnurse

Online pharmacies have to have a vet supervising dispensing don't they? Obviously they don't have the overheads of a surgery but they don't have the income from consultations, surgeries etc......

Online pharmacies are either run by vets (generally in my experience very rarely)pharmacists or people who have undergone the suitably qualified persons exams. from the RCVS website:

[QUOTE]The new Veterinary Medicines Regulations allow owners to buy prescription-only medicines from any veterinary surgeon or pharmacist. Which veterinary medicines pharmacists and veterinary surgeons choose to stock will be a matter for commercial decision[/QUOTE]
SQP's are now added to this list

I am wondering how many of you would scream and shout and point blank refuse to bring your pets to vets if the consultation fees and surgery fees were hiked up so we could drop the drug prices to compete with the online pharmacies???

As for vets with brand new cars and personalised number plates- the cars are generally leased and used as tax relief and then only if the vet owns the practice, personalised number plates I can count on one finger the number of vets I have worked with, from 9 yrs in practice, several practices and approx 60 vets I have worked with, that have had them! I have known partners in practices that have appeared to everyone to be thriving that are still driving 11 yr old cars!

Insurance is becoming widespread now and practices are in general from where i have worked trying to promote understanding on different levels of cover.

wuno

I note that the original thread referred to at the start of this poll has now been deleted, so to remind you all what you are voting for, Snowman2 and myself, who run seemingly similar practices did back of an envelope calculations and worked out that for us to be able to reduce our standard markup on drugs to 30% we would have to increase the prices of all professional fees by 7-8%. That's on everything, not just consulting; from cruciate ops to cutting nails.....

And if we were not to increase our markup on outsourced diagnostic tests and cremation (these are another story!), I bet you'd be looking at increasing professional fees by 10%.