Vet price for urine analysis test!

mjv1986

Hi

I have recently taken my cat to the vet as she was peeing red wee which I presumed was blood in her pee!

I took her to the vets and the vet tried to get a urine sample and couldn't, so we had to get one from home! We got one, brought it back and was told it would cost £60 for a urine test!

It seems to me a bit steep for sticking a stick thing in a testing for a few different things? I was just wondering if this is the usual price for one of these tests?

Thanks in advance for any help

con1888

I would say yes this is normal price, vets are pretty expensive, the test is probably sent to a lab to be tested.

I got my puppy his second jabs, eye drops and a wormer and was around £50.

Nod_Off

No it's not which makes me think they might be sending it away to a lab for full analysis. I took a urine sample to be tested at the end of last year and was charged about £7.

Did you pay for the consultation at the time or could that be included in the £60?

con1888

Nod_Off wrote: »

No it's not which makes me think they might be sending it away to a lab for full analysis. I took a urine sample to be tested at the end of last year and was charged about £7.

Did you pay for the consultation at the time or could that be included in the £60?

That was my thinking, consultation included.

krlyr

Remember that you're the customer - ask your vet what the test consists of. They may well be doing more than sticking a few test strips into the urine, for example I had a UTI and had to have the sample sent off to find out if it was resistant to any particular antibiotics. Cats are quite prone to issues with stones/crystals, kidney issues, etc. so they may be looking at the levels of certain things in the urine.

http://www.petwave.com/Cats/Health/Kidney-Urinary/UTI/Diagnosis.aspx

Urinalysis is easy and inexpensive to perform and involves four major steps after the urine sample is obtained: visual examination, chemical analysis using pre-treated dipsticks, measurement of urine specific gravity and microscopic examination of the urine.

Remember that you're not just paying for a few test strips, but your bill covers all sorts of things involved. From paying for the testing equipment (and maintenance), to the wages of the vet who saw you, the receptionist who booked you in and took your payment, made a checkup appoint etc, to the nursing staff who may ferry results back and forth and even covering the costs of training staff to use the equipment involved. The electricity needed to run the practice so that you could be seen in the first place, and all this medical equipment can be run, the water to provide you with a clean consultation room and to keep on top of good hygeine, the telephone line so they can get in contact with you for the results, and so on. Their prices have to cover all their costs, they are a business so cannot simply charge you for materials.
At the end of the day, we're very spoilt with the NHS, to have this procedure done to yourself could cost you a lot more than £60...
http://www.medichecks.com/index.cfm?s=2&d=21&test=UMIC&name=Urine%20Microscopy
And a vet isn't just a GP either, they're a surgeon, consultation, often a specialist in certain subjects..yet you'd pay a private surgeon probably a hell of a lot more than a private GP for 5 minutes of his time!

orlao

I pay £13 for an inhouse urine test but on the other hand I've paid £78 for an idexx urine test that had to be sent off by courier to the lab...that's going to bump the price right up!

Fire_Fox

Exactly what were they testing for? Are you sure they only used strips and didn't examine it under a microscope or culture any bacteria?