For the most part, this has been a good place to take our animals. My family has used this…read moreveterinary practice for approximately 30 years, through many pets. We have had our animals spayed or neutered, vaccinated, and provided with preventative care. We have always paid our bills at the time of service.
Now our oldest dog is experiencing a serious medical emergency. We are facing the possibility of a procedure that could potentially cost thousands of dollars. Instead of empathy, compassion, or even a willingness to discuss how we might work through the financial aspect of an emergency, what we received was essentially: this is what it costs, and if you can't pay it, you will have to finance it.
I am still in disbelief at the callousness of the conversation I had with the person on the phone, particularly when these may be some of the last moments I have with a beloved animal my family has cared for for many years. We asked about a payment arrangement. We explained our circumstances. We explained our history with this practice. We were told financing was the option available to us.
Veterinary professionals go into this field because they care about animals--or at least that is what pet owners desperately want to believe. Yet during one of the scariest and most dire moments my family has experienced with one of our animals, the overwhelming concern communicated to us was the bottom line: money upfront.
Thirty years. Our animals have been cared for responsibly. Vaccinated. Spayed and neutered. Given preventative medicine. Bills paid. We have never left this practice holding an unpaid balance. And now, because we cannot pass a credit check or produce hundreds or potentially thousands of dollars immediately, our critically ill dog has to wait.
And before anyone thinks, "If you can't afford a pet, don't have one," please understand that this was unexpected. We are ordinary working people living in a time when groceries, utilities, housing, transportation, and nearly everything else have become enormously expensive. Being unable to immediately produce several thousand dollars does not mean an animal has been neglected or unloved.
What is particularly painful is knowing that after decades of reliably paying this practice, none of that history was enough for even a modest payment arrangement during an emergency. We weren't asking for thousands of dollars of free veterinary care. We were asking whether people we had trusted with our animals for decades could work with us while one of them was critically ill.
So for other working families looking for a veterinarian, understand this before an emergency happens: our decades-long history with this practice did not result in flexibility when we desperately needed it. We were required to have the money upfront or qualify for outside financing.
I hope the people responsible for these policies genuinely reflect on what that means for animals and the families who love them. We cannot possibly be the only family who has found themselves in this position.
You have training and knowledge that allow you to help animals when ordinary people cannot. There are families who desperately need that help. And when the only barrier between a suffering animal and veterinary care is whether their owner can immediately produce the entire amount or pass a credit check, something has gone terribly wrong.
I sincerely hope none of the people involved ever experience the helplessness of desperately needing someone capable of helping a loved one, asking that person to work with you, and being told no because you cannot produce enough money immediately.
Thirty years of trusting this practice with our animals, and this is what we experienced when we needed compassion the most. Shame on you.
