Looking for new vet

Principesa and I both had some boo-boos these past two weeks.

One evening last week, Principesa came in from the yard with a scrape on her muzzle and little tears at the edges of her ears. She wasn’t crying or anything, which was unusual, since she’s, umm, how should we say this? She’s not shy about letting you know how she feels, especially if she’s in pain.

Anyway, the cuts healed nicely and she’s back to her old tricks (see pic below). We still don’t know what she encountered in the garden (maybe a mole?).

Now, me. Mom and Dad took me to the vet this Wednesday evening to get a little bump on my groin checked out. My vet said it was most likely irritation from a tick bite, nothing serious. But he recommended a cortisone shot so I would stop licking and further irritating it.

So my vet came back in with two syringes, which mom & dad thought was strange. But Dad had to hold me, and Mom had to comfort the Principesa who was fussing around. Why was she doing that? She wasn’t getting shots.

We then rushed home, since the evening rush hour traffic was already building up. At home, my lethargy and total lack of energy was quite noticeable.

That’s when dad noticed the vet receipt, where we were charged not for a cortisone shot, but two vaccines (bordatella and DHPP) and they freaked out. Mom called the vet, got the assistant since my doctor had left for home. She told them of the time two years ago when I got a round of vaccines and a few hours later, my head started shaking. This was when I had just joined the family, and mom ‘n dad didn’t know my history. My vets in Texas had no idea what was going on, and somehow, I just rode it out. But since then, mom ‘n dad made it a point never to give me more than one vaccine at a time (esp with dhpp), and I always got my shots in the morning, in case there was an emergency.

“Well,” the vet assistant asked, “did you tell Doctor Vet about these reactions?”

“No,” yelled mom. “We didn’t know he was being given vaccines!”

The assistant said that the vet would call us back. Instead, we got another call from the assistant, who said to give me Benadryl to ward off a reaction. Mom said no way, asked for info to the nearest 24-hour vet just in case. She and dad took turns checking on me thru the night. But by the next day, I was fine, back to cavorting around with Principesa.

Mom says that this incident was disappointing, because we always had a good relationship with this particular vet. But he works for a national chain of vet clinics, and in the past few months, mom says the quality of service has gone down. Some of the partners had left, and he’s been seeing more patients and seems more rushed. He seemed tired when he saw me, and he was seeing patients at the rate of one every 20 minutes. Maybe that’s why he ended up giving me vaccines without consulting mom ‘n dad

We’re looking for a new vet now, probably someone with a small private practice who doesn’t have to fill a quota of patients. I feel bad we have to leave, but mom says the trust has been broken, and no way we’re going back.

Any tips on how to find a new vet?

Mom is pretty mad at herself too for not being more assertive in questioning the vet (“Hey, doctor, why two syringes for the cortisone?”), so this is a gentle reminder for y’all out there as well.

Oh, a final thing. I never did get the cortisone shot, but the little bump is now gone. Everything is back to normal in the Tex household, as you can see below:

Chow!