Took Dog to Vet - UPDATE PAGE 3 GRAPHIC PIC

[Tuffoldhen]

Quote:
I had to take a young kitten to the vet a few years ago for the same thing. The vet called it a warble and showed me how it was cut and cleaned. I said well I could have done that and he said yes you could have!

So 75.00 later and meds in tow I now knew what a warble or grub hole was on an animal! Just haven't had any like that yet or I would operate on them myself!

 

[runarounbrown]

Ok! Thanks for your reply...how do I post it in new thread. I was trying to find conversation similar to my question. Like I said I am new to this.

 

[19hhbelgian]

Maybe you said, but I saw you're in NE PA, & was wondering what area... It's terrible. We have started giving our animals all of their shots. You can also buy rabies shots. That's illegal in some states, but not PA (yet

) Performing surgeries such as gelding a horse w/o being a vet IS illegal, don't know about other states though. I wouldn't do it, even if it was legal, but that's just me

Other wise, we do any and all care with in reason for our "kids". We recently had to have surgery on our little Shiba Inu... She tore her second cruciate ligament

Our local vet was more expensive than the specialist in MD, which is where we took her - he is the best in what he does & to us it was worth taking her down there. The first surgery went so well she was better than before she tore the ligament

... Anyway, that cost us $1400 twice. That's an incredible amount of $ for us right now, but at least it was something we definitely couldn't fix on our own...

 

[redhen]

Heres some bot flys in a dog for you..

 

[faykokoWV]

Quote:
Man, I should not have watched that first thing in the morning.

are these bug/grubs a regional thing? I've never heard of them.

 

[fowltemptress]

I've heard of them, but only in the context of not eating rabbits during a certain time of year, because they could have warbles. After looking up what they actually are, I can't see how the warbles could hurt the meat, except to gross out whoever is skinning the rabbit. Is there actually a valid reason not to eat the meat from a warble infested critter?

 

[Tuffoldhen]

Same thing happens to squirrels around hunting season time in the Fall. Only thing I can think of for not eating the meat is an infection as set in. DH does not bring home squirrels that he has found warbles in after a hunt.

 

[chickerdoodle]

Quote:
The difficulty is that while a buncha people may want inexpensive basic care from a 'simple' vet practice, a buncha OTHER people get pretty miffed when they find out the vet cannot do an ultrasound, must send them to another clinic but all but the simplest surgery, bloodwork takes 2 days b/c it must be sent out to a lab, the waiting room is 10 ft square and the cats and dogs are in each others' laps, that sort of thing. When an animal has a problem needing those sorts of mid-level technology and a vet can't provide them, clients tend to wander off to other vet practices. Plus of course the VET tends to want reasonable technology available, because no matter what you may think, most vets WANT to figure out what's wrong with an animal and fix it, and get frustrated at being limited by inadequate equipment or facilities.

Most vets AFAIK structure their pricing so that routine health care is partially subsidizing catastrophic healthcare. Which I think is reasonable, and in animals' best interests. Also, the amount of overhead to run what most people would consider a decently-equipped vet clinic is quite considerable. Not just purchase price but employees, utilities, property tax on the clinic (or rental of the space), etc. So remember that your charges are not JUST paying for, like 15 minutes of the vet's time plus twelve inches of suture material and a squirt of betadine; your money has to cover a lot more that is not directly visible at the time.

Believe me, I know how frustrating it is to not be able to afford treatment or diagnostics for your animals that you feel you owe them. Nonetheless, although it varies, the vets I know do not really make all that much money, they are not millionaires, they are living middle to upper middle class lifestyles. (And heaven knows they are not paying their employees rich salaries either

)

I am not sure why one should begrudge a vet the ability to be middle-class or upper-middle-class any more than one should begrudge providers of other equally-necessary services, such as dentists, electricians, mechanics, etc. (All of which I realize people sometimes complain about *their* pricing too, but seldom with the degree of venom that seems to be directed against vets, hereabouts)

It's just a difficult situation and boils down to the same thing in any other part of life - there is never as much money to go around as there are things we'd like it to go around *to*.

Pat

Well said

-simply stated. I tried to explain but evidently didn't do as well as you.

 

[chickerdoodle]

Quote:
No way to know what's going on without an exam. I can tell you that cats are very prone to kidney disease at his age (not the same as being plugged up--that's the bladder). If he goes outside there are many viruses that can also make him ill. I'm sorry to say that he should have an exam and most likley blood and urine tests.

Once cats stop eating they can sometimes be hard to get them to start again even once they are treated for the initial cause of the problem. Try asking your vet and animal control if there is any program locally to assist you in this matter so you can get him help.

 

[speckledhen]

Sadly, I can no longer afford to own a dog after my 12 yr old girl is gone. The older one died a couple years ago. We have to think about our own health care and the prices are just crazy for vet care. And folks ask me about taking a chicken to a vet, sheesh. This is why we take care of our own birds here and if we cant fix something, we euthanize the bird.

I see the squirrels looking mangey with those bots here this time of year. Yuck.