Vets Fees

[kris]

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my big old cat sam went into our vets yesterday for a couple of teeth out.poor old fella had an abscess and all his face had swollen. hed been on antibiotics for a few days before his op which had taken the swelling down a bit.anyway the thing is when i came to pay the bill it was 140 pounds and as i had never had anything like this done before i didnt query it as i didnt know if it was expensive or cheap or what.then speaking to daughter last night she thought it was expensive as when her whippet buffy went to the same vets to have some teeth out they charged exactly the same,140 quid. :blink: she said to me that she thought it would have been cheaper for a cat as the cost of anaesthesia etc.anyone here had similar op with a cat and should it be the same price as for a dog or what?

 

[~Sarah~]

That seems very expensive to me :- " - I think I would ask them to itemise the bill so that you can see how the charges have been calculated.

 

[sharron]

My mil will be having her carin terriers teeth cleaned next week, it is costing her £106 . thats if there are no other problems. :b

 

[J.T.]

My cat had 2 teeth out & a clean & polish last year & it was £115.

I was expecting it to be more so was quite pleased.

I do know that cats have very fragile jaws which fracture quite easily so the vets have to be very careful when extracting teeth.

So if Sams teeth were fairly well anchored & only had to come out cos of the absess then maybe it took quite a while to do. If they were all loose & wobbly/falling out anyway then that's my theory shot to pieces :lol:

I hope Sam is feeling better :huggles:

 

[kris]

hmmmm i think ive been overcharged then.when our jac said last night that buffys op was the same price i was surprised.ill have a word with dominic the owner and see what he says.they made a mess of buffys teeth left in a couple of wobbly ones that should have come out.jac went back and gave him a good telling off! (w00t) thing is cos she works in dentistry she knows what shes on about! :thumbsup: sam is fine today and poor lad is sooooo grateful to be rid of those bad teeth. :wub: he was all over me this morning purring and rubbing himself against my hand as i was sleepily trying to make a cup of coffee! thansk for the info folks.any more will be gratefully received as back up ammo! :- " :lol:

 

[05whippet]

my big old cat sam went into our vets yesterday for a couple of teeth out.poor old fella had an abscess and all his face had swollen. hed been on antibiotics  for a few days before his op which had taken the swelling down a bit.anyway the thing is when i came to pay the bill it was 140 pounds and as i had never had anything like this done before i didnt query it as i didnt know if it was expensive or cheap or what.then speaking to daughter last night she thought it was expensive as when her whippet buffy went to the same vets to have some teeth out they charged exactly the same,140 quid. :blink: she said to me that she thought it would have been cheaper for a cat as the cost of anaesthesia etc.anyone here had similar op with a cat and should it be the same price as for a dog or what?

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That does seem expensive to me Kris,but then I am of the belief that being a vet is a bit like having a license to print money!! :- "

Although we had the equine dentist out at one of our horses last year for an extraction and it only cost £65,bearing in mind that that incuded a call out fee AND the anaesthsia (and he is 16.2hh,for those of you non horsey that means BIG!! ) as well as the actual extraction. I thought it was very reasonable

Hope Sam is not feeling too sore and gets back to normal very soon Kris. :huggles:

 

[wild whippies]

So if Sams teeth were fairly well anchored & only had to come out cos of the absess then maybe it took quite a while to do. If they were all loose & wobbly/falling out anyway then that's my theory shot to pieces :lol:

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Well that's just it Julie abscesses destroy bone tissue surrounding the teeth and a prolonged one can result in the tooth getting wobbly which makes removal slightly easier. With humans teeth get decayed and break or are impacted so their removal is understandibly difficult. Pets usually loose their teeth from gum disease in the effected area but the tooth itself is generally ok so there should be enough to grab hold of when removing. With Buffy they had missed a wobbly back tooth (one which I suspected had caused her a lymph node swelling) and removed other teeth that weren't extensively effected. When I took her back to point out this mistake they was very apologetic and agreed to remove the tooth for free. My problem was that I wasn't happy for her to have yet another anaesthetic in a short period of time and I questioned the neccesity of it as the tooth was very mobile. I did suggest sedation or a relative analgesia but was told that apparently dogs have very curved roots on their teeth and that the tooth would need to have the crown removed and the roots sectioned with a drill. Personally I beg to differ as not only had I examined the tooth but Tony had too (dentist) and we both felt this tooth would of come out with the bare minimum of force. At the end of the day I agreed to the full general anaesthetic because I do believe the vet should feel comfortable with how they want to do the procedure and if cost had been an issue to the vet then the options I suggested would of been cheaper (bearing in mind he was doing it for free).

I do tend to think that removing teeth on a cat maybe somewhat more difficult though for the reasons Julie said (small narrow jaws and fine teeth etc) so I presume the cost reflects this?

 

[palooka]

i agree with the" being a vet is a license to print money" statement and to be honest i've found most most vets to be slightly patronising. with the advent of the internet and mail order vet meds, most types of medication are freely available, so there's very few things that you can't treat yourself and at a fraction of the price. i recently innoculated two pups at a cost of 10 euro's each ( £ 14 for both), a vet would have charge around £100.

 

[kris]

when i lived in the usa we always used to go to the vet for the vaccine and it cost about 3 pounds then we would bring the vaccine home and innoculate the pups ourselves.so did everybody else.innoculations are one of the biggest rip offs there are :angry:

 

[kita]

On another forum a person had a six month old dog. It started being sick in the evening, they phoned the vet. Because it was out of hours their vet transferred the work to another practice. They said that unless the person had 95 pounds they would not even see the dog and they would have to wait until the morning and take it into their normal vets. They had to sit and watch their pup growing weaker and weaker as the night went on. The dog died at 5.30am. On talking to the normal vet the following day, they said they suspected the dog had bloat and the out of hours vet would not have operated anyhow unless they could produce 1,000 pounds up front!!

It would have made no difference whatsoever if they were insured, the vet wanted the money up front, before any treatment.

How many people can produce 1,100 on demand!

They have now phoned round the practices in their area and are going to a practice that covers their own out of hours treatment, this practice also look at the animal then sort out the payment.

It is worth checking what your vet does for out of hours treatment, before you need them! Also do they demand payment up front?

When your animal is ill and in need of urgent treatment you cannot think straight and don't want to be phoning round all the vets in your area looking for one that will treat your pet!

 

[maggymills]

it may be more expensive if the cats old and need pre-anaesthetice blood tests??

also if the cats old it takes more work during anaesthetic and maybe another nurse too? i remember elderly cat dentals being quite intricate- takes a longer time and more staff, the nurse will also spend more time observing the catand more time spent with your cat as it is waking up to make sue it all goes smoothly..

there are more reasons, but im too tired to remember more!

hope all goes well xx :*

 

[kris]

hes not that old maggymills and the vets asked me a number of questions about sams health and general condition.she said she could do blood tests but she doubted he needed them as he seemed in a1 condition.im definately going to query it with my regular vet as i think after seeing some of the posts here it was maybe a little ott?

kita thats a terrible story and makes you wonder if you ought to check out your own vets practice about out of hours problems.

 

[~Sarah~]

On another forum a person had a six month old dog.  It started being sick in the evening, they phoned the vet.  Because it was out of hours their vet transferred the work to another practice.  They said that unless the person had 95 pounds they would not even see the dog and they would have to wait until the morning and take it into their normal vets.  They had to sit and watch their pup growing weaker and weaker as the night went on.  The dog died at 5.30am.  On talking to the normal vet the following day, they said they suspected the dog had bloat and the out of hours vet would not have operated anyhow unless they could produce 1,000 pounds up front!!
It would have made no difference whatsoever if they were insured, the vet wanted the money up front, before any treatment.

How many people can produce 1,100 on demand!

They have now phoned round the practices in their area and are going to a practice that covers their own out of hours treatment, this practice also look at the animal then sort out the payment.

It is worth checking what your vet does for out of hours treatment, before you need them!  Also do they demand payment up front?

When your animal is ill and in need of urgent treatment you cannot think straight and don't want to be phoning round all the vets in your area looking for one that will treat your pet!

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How tragic.

When I worked for a vet (many years ago) they had a duty to treat any animal, whatever the time of day or night, regardless of the owner's ability to pay. Perhaps things have changed nowadays, but I thought vets actually had an obligation and couldn't refuse to carry out treatment.

For example, what happens when an animal has been in a RTA and no owner is present, or when wild animals are injured?

 

[05whippet]

On another forum a person had a six month old dog.  It started being sick in the evening, they phoned the vet.  Because it was out of hours their vet transferred the work to another practice.  They said that unless the person had 95 pounds they would not even see the dog and they would have to wait until the morning and take it into their normal vets.  They had to sit and watch their pup growing weaker and weaker as the night went on.  The dog died at 5.30am.  On talking to the normal vet the following day, they said they suspected the dog had bloat and the out of hours vet would not have operated anyhow unless they could produce 1,000 pounds up front!!
It would have made no difference whatsoever if they were insured, the vet wanted the money up front, before any treatment.

How many people can produce 1,100 on demand!

They have now phoned round the practices in their area and are going to a practice that covers their own out of hours treatment, this practice also look at the animal then sort out the payment.

It is worth checking what your vet does for out of hours treatment, before you need them!  Also do they demand payment up front?

When your animal is ill and in need of urgent treatment you cannot think straight and don't want to be phoning round all the vets in your area looking for one that will treat your pet!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

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How tragic.

When I worked for a vet (many years ago) they had a duty to treat any animal, whatever the time of day or night, regardless of the owner's ability to pay. Perhaps things have changed nowadays, but I thought vets actually had an obligation and couldn't refuse to carry out treatment.

For example, what happens when an animal has been in a RTA and no owner is present, or when wild animals are injured?

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I don't know about any pratices over in England but here (in Northern Ireland) I can tell you a little story about what happened with an RTA........we have a friend whose young Lurcher got out of their garden and headed down onto the main carriageway,reulting in an RTA,luckily the people who hit the dog stopped and got out to check on him...his front leg was severely broken and his lower jaw along with other minor injuries,our friend (the dogs owner) arrived at the scene in a terrible state,and the people who hit the dog very kindly offered to take the dog to the nearest vet,which they did - the FIRST thing the vet asked was "who is going to pay for this?" PROBLEM 1:- our friend is only 17 and is currently unemployed so had no way of paying for the dog,PROBLEM 2:- the people who hit the dog offered to pay half the costs if he fronted the other half (which he could'nt do),so what on earth was the outcome????? Well the people who hit the dog then offered to pay the full amount (£750) IF and only IF they could keep the dog!! (they obviously could'nt watch the animal be in pain and felt somewhat responsible for hitting it in the first place BUT they also were'nt prepared to just hand over that amount of money for nothing) to which our friend who was horrified was adamant that was not going to happen.Now bear in mind all this time these debates were going on the dog is still in pain,losing blood and has'nt been touched by the vet!! So in the end our friend really had no choice but to let the people pay for the dogs vet fees AND take the dog.....he said that there was no way that he could pay for the dogs fees and he also could'nt watch the animal anymore being in pain,so the decision was made......was he right??? I will leave that for you decide,but what would you have done????

Incidently this does just hi-light the fact that owning any pet can be a very expensive business,but how many people have that sort of money spare or even think about the expense BEFORE they accquire a pet?

So to get back to the question posed above by Sarah,with an RTA (over here anyway) vets - and I am not saying that they are all like this one mentioned above - still want to know where the money is coming from!! Sad but true

 

[kris]

wow!that reminds me of the old story about the wisdom of solomon.two women came to him with a newborn baby.they both claimed to be the mother.so to try to find out who the real mother was solomon said bring me a sword i will cut the child in two and you shall have half each.as he was the king and had undisputed control over his people his word was law.as his sword was given to him one of the women threw herself in front of him and begged that the chiild should live and that he should give it to the other woman rather than kill it.he then gave the child to the woman who begged for the childs life.here,he said i now know who the real mother is.only the real mother would be willing to give the child away rather than kill it.(lecture over now folks,here endeth the first lesson!) o