When was the last time you needed to take a dog to the veterinarian after regular business hours – you know, in an emergency? In the past few years alone, I’ve taken dogs (foster and my own) to the closest hospital providing 24-hour emergency services at least a half dozen times, for a puppy with a suspected broken leg (it wasn’t), a puppy with an injured eye (remember Odin? He eventually had to have the eye removed, despite prompt and lengthy treatment), and several times for my dog Woody, who has had after-hours treatment for lots of things.
NOTHING happens to Woody during regular hours! He’s needed stitches (cut his back legs on something while skidding to a stop playing fetch), swallowed a small tennis ball (they made him vomit it up), had a suspected bloat (he had gotten into the foster Great Dane puppies’ food and ate way too much, but was able to start pooping and get relief while we waited for service), and one night, he tanked with a sudden fever and vomiting and diarrhea (not sure what that was, but he was hospitalized overnight on fluids and antibiotics and recovered).
It’s been a couple of years since he’s needed emergency care – KNOCK WOOD – but if you have an accident-prone dog like Woody, take note: Many veterinary hospitals who ordinarily provide 24-hour, emergency services have begun suspending those emergency hours and overnight service. In my area alone, the closest three hospitals I could take a dog or puppy to in the middle of the night have suspended overnight service indefinitely. All three are citing staffing shortages as the reason for this. If something happened to my dog tonight, I’d be driving about 80 miles to the closest emergency vet hospital still operating overnight – and, presumably, so would a lot of other people whose hospitals did the same. The domino effect here, alone, is terrifying to ponder, with so many cases flowing to a few concentrated emergency-care providers.
I was first alerted to this by a friend who forwarded an email that one of her training clients had received from the emergency care provider in our area, stating that the hospital was closing at 9p.m., and no longer available for emergency care until 7 a.m. Since my trainer friend also provides boarding services, and needs to be able to take clients’ dogs for care in case of an emergency, she started calling around to see if the next closest emergency-care providers were available. That’s when she discovered that two more had followed suit and suspended their overnight emergency services. All three hospitals are citing staffing shortages as the reason for the suspension.
Shortly after I learned this, I saw an article (linked here) posted on a friend’s Facebook page, discussing the suspension of emergency veterinary services by a BluePearl Pet Hospital in North Seattle. Several friends of my California friend commented that the same thing was happening in their towns – in Colorado, New Jersey, Oregon …
So, just a heads-up: It might be worth a call to whatever veterinary hospital you usually go to in case of an overnight emergency, to check to see if they are still providing service after regular business hours. If they are not, it’s better to know now, so you’d know where to go in case of an actual emergency without a last-minute panic.
And also: Has this happened in your area? If so, please post a comment here.
I live in Indiana and we still have some emergency vets. That being said, I had to to take a foster dog , a 3# Chihuahua to ER due to her not eating or drinking, vomiting and bloody diarrhea. I had been trying everything I knew to address the issues, but after day 4 , I knew she needed medical help. So off I went, I had to wait in the car for 9hours!!! In the end I was very disappointed with the care or lack thereof that she received. They did blood work, said it was all normal, gave her sub cu fluids and a dose of Metronidazole and told me to keep doing what I had been. Charge for this???? $1050!!!
2 days later, still no better, finally found a regular vet to see her, diagnosis, hemorrhagic gastroenteritis, lung infection and luxating patellas. The latter had nothing to do with her issues, but that was what they found upon full exam. Sent her home with some kind of paste(can’t remember the name) gave her a shot of antibiotics and more sub cu fluids. Cost….$130!! She is now fine eating and pooping normally!!
I feel very lucky — I just learned of a brand new emergency-only practice that opened up in San Ramon, CA, called Veterinary Emergency Group (VEG). They’re open 24/7 and advertise that you can stay with your pet during all phases of treatment — hooray! My regular vet, who told me about them, said he’s received nothing but positive feedback from clients who have gone there, and he hasn’t seen any issues with their treatment (on the other hand, he said that one of the more established emergency hospitals in the area is relying on new graduates with little supervision, and he is seeing problems because of that). Note VEG has more than 20 emergency clinics across the country:
https://veterinaryemergencygroup.com/
One more point in their favor — VEG has agreed to take on certain wildlife patients when Lindsay Wildlife Hospital is closed, at no cost! Lindsay will be training them on what they need to know; it should be a great benefit to wildlife and those who want to help them.
Thanks Mary, I checked and they also have a location in Chicago. (It looks to be fairly new as I go past there occasionally and haven’t noticed.) We’re fortunate to have several emergency vets on the north side and near north suburbs, but as far as I know, they are still not allowing owners in with their pets. This looks to be a much more positive experience.
We still have one clinic here in a smaller-town area of Wisconsin that offers emergency care all night. However, one of my dogs needed this care about a month ago, and it turned out that the vet on call took an hour to get to the clinic because of the distance at which she lives, and then they charged an emergency after hours fee of $275 as well as an urgent care fee of $77. That was a total of $352 just to go in the door. I could have driven my dog to the emergency hospital in Madison in an equal amount of time and been seen for just under $100, plus gotten my dog care by board certified emergency vets. My impression was that this local clinic is trying to discourage clients from using their emergency service while at the same time touting that they offer such service. They’ve also recently gotten on the bandwagon of charging urgent fees for anything not booked a couple months in advance. This makes me very angry. If a pet gets sick or hurt, you cannot plan that a couple months ahead of time and book them in, and it’s ridiculous to think that pets in that situation can wait weeks to be seen. Just strikes me as a money-making ripoff. Very disappointed in the turns my long-term clinic has taken lately and am changing vets.
I have the answer why. I am a CVT with many years experience. The ‘short-staffed’ is due to pay for veterinary technicians. VCA and Blue Pearl are famous among vet techs for not valuing (paying) the techs enough.
Veterinary technicians are the backbone of the veterinary world. The doctors diagnose, prescribe and do surgery. Everything else is done by veterinary technicians. Some who have degrees from AVMA accredited schools. Some have specialty accreditation in emergency, surgery, behavior, etc.
No one is going to take a job at $14/hr with a promise of a raise. Veterinary corporations should be ashamed.
I am currently working at my county’s only emergency vet hospital. I was working full time (less than 6 months) as receptionist there, but got a non- emergency veterinary position elsewhere, and am still filling in occasionally. I had to wait for vet care myself before starting to work there, (during the pandemic) and waited 5+ hours (twice!) to have my dog seen for a “non-critical” condition. So yes, I know how stressful it is to wait outside! But working there, dealing with every single pet owner upset, angry, and unhappy is unbelievably awful for me, and certainly affects every other employee there. I imagine that you’ve all heard the statistics showing veterinarians and vet techs have the highest suicide rates of any profession. I totally get that! This hospital is corporate owned, formed when they bought out both emergency hospitals in our county and merged them into one facility. We too have had to close to non-critical patients almost every day. Like others said, it’s harder to get in to the regular vets since the pandemic, so numbers of pets going to emergency has exploded. We are limited by number of kennels available in our ICU, as well as staffing shortages. I don’t know about the veterinarians, but the pay rate for technicians and receptionists is not good.
It was not worth the emotional thrashing I felt at the end of every shift there for me to continue working there. Now I try to go back and help out when I can, mostly to offer support to all those beautiful people who keep showing up to their jobs there because they love animals.
Just my 2cents worth.
AMEN
I have always had to drive 50 mi to the Emergency Hospital for my dogs. They have always encouraged clients to call ahead to let them know we’re coming and, so far have always had someone waiting at the door to receive my dog. So I guess I’m one of the lucky ones.
It’s also happening here in Ontario, Canada. My own vet suspended emergency services about 5 years ago. Many other vets are also suspending emergency after hours services. The vets that still do offer after hours service offer it to their own clients only. My closest emergency hospital is a two hour drive away. It’s not just the emergency after hours service, though. My vet started her maternity leave in April and had great difficulty in finding anyone to even cover off her day-only shifts. No one seems to want to work and no one seems to have animal welfare in mind.
We haven’t had emergency services in our area, Truckee/Tahoe City for a number of years now. It’s at least a one hour drive to Reno for emergency services, and I know of a few people who have lost their pets because of the long drive….
The lack of emergency services happened here many years before the pandemic, and I don’t understand how as a vet you don’t feel a certain obligation to provide care to the animals.
Between the daunting cost of veterinary care and now this additional stress of not even being able to find good care if an emergency strikes, sadly I find it even harder to adopt my next dog, much as I miss that dear companionship, Between the heartbreak of losing beloved dogs and the budgetary restrictions of retirement, I find the risk is too high.
P.S. Having two goats is interesting….they are loving, adore going on walks, have quirky and cute personalities and go to vets whose prices are amazingly affordable!!!!! Which makes me wonder what has happened to our small animal veterinary practices…..I know they need to earn a living, but something is very wrong.
Yes! My collie/shepherd needed constant surveillance. I wound up driving her 40 miles to the night emergency vet, but then had to pick her up by 7 am and take her back to our regular vet. Did this twice, since our vet closed at 5 pm. Very sadly, got a call that 3rd night that she was gone. If she hadn’t been shuffled back and forth….?
Here in central Texas where it’s at least an hour to any ER clinic, several have closed. Of those staying open they are not accepting clients due to overwhelming demand for services. This is very upsetting as it is snake season and it seems to be a very active one at that. There are few options for emergency animal care of any kind at this point. I feel for the staff but I certainly hope a solution presents itself soon.