OOH Vets - how can this be right ?

[MurphysMinder]

Can I start by saying I am not anti-vet, my daughter is one and I have fabulous horse and small animal vets for my animals. However, I think the whole big corporate, separate ooh thing is awful.
A friends dog was not well on Friday, taken to own vet, given medication but no improvement so back to vet on Saturday and put on a drip. This practice doesn't cover ooh so Saturday evening my friend had to pick up her dog and take him 40 minutes away to the ooh hospital. Then Sunday morning she had to pick him up and bring him back to own vets where he had exploratory surgery. Sunday evening he was taken back to ooh vets again. I haven't heard any update today but it wasn't sounding too good , but how an earth can all that travelling back and forth be in the best interests of a very poorly dog, particularly post operative?

 

[CorvusCorax]

This happened to a friend of mine when her bitch took a pyo. Absolute joke.

 

[misst]

This happens round here a lot. I was lucky when Ruby was very poorly on a BH weekend. My wonderful vet missed a wedding to stay back and care for her and another dog who were in and really unwell. He was amazing. He also phoned me several times a day to update me.

She had had an exploratory laparotomy because her bowel was paralysed though no one knew why. The laparotomy showed nothing but it was still major surgery. She had IVs and antibiotics etc as well as pain relief and he felt she would be better with him than OOH. A 4 night stay with surgery and meds, an ultrasound, bloods, xrays and drips cost me 2.5k. Goodness knows what it would have cost at OOH.

This is why I love my vet. Usually they would have transferred her, they told me, but I am unconvinced. I think where possible they keep their own patients. There was only him all weekend - no nurse as they should have been closed. I bought him some very nice wine to say thank you. We are lucky. The local OOH charges over £300 for a basic look at an animal - all treat is extra and very expensive compared to my vets.

 

[MurphysMinder]

This happened to a friend of mine when her bitch took a pyo. Absolute joke.

The dog belongs to a mutual friend who we met up with when you visited

 

[Annette4]

It's why we moved to a vets much further away as they're the only ones who do their own in house OOH. Our last 2 vets moved to an outsourced OOH and I'd have had to transport them myself.

The vets (not OOH) we just left also refused treatment to a friends dog without £2k up front without even doing diagnostics because she wasnt insured. They refused and took her to another vet. She just had an infection and she's now fine.

 

[MurphysMinder]

It's why we moved to a vets much further away as they're the only ones who do their own in house OOH. Our last 2 vets moved to an outsourced OOH and I'd have had to transport them myself.

The vets (not OOH) we just left also refused treatment to a friends dog without £2k up front without even doing diagnostics because she wasnt insured. They refused and took her to another vet. She just had an infection and she's now fine.

I moved to another vet for the same reason. Oh yes my friend had to give all insurance details whilst booking him in or would have had to pay £3k up front.

 

[meleeka]

This is precisely why I stick with my vets. It’s a corporate but is a hospital too, with OOH. Unfortunately, the equine unit doesn’t do its own OOH, so if my favourite vet leaves, I will definitely move too. A friend had to ferry her dog around for a week a few years back when she used the vets in Pets at Home.

 

[TheMule]

The alternative for small practices is their own vets working ridiculous OOH shifts to cover the emergency work. If the dog stays in then someone needs to be on site the whole time caring for them, it simply isn’t sustainable (or legal) for many to do. If that wasn’t the case then owners would face far higher bills to pay for a team of OOH vets to support then routine hours vets

 

[Teaselmeg]

I stick with my vets because they provided an OOH service. Not cheap, but at least if my dogs are poorly they won't be moved around for overnight care.

 

[AmyMay]

My vet doesn’t have out of hours cover either sadly (they are a small local practice). However the referral vet I took Jack to when he was very sick do. They’re 40 mins away, so should the need arise Daisy would go there for treatment.

 

[MurphysMinder]

The alternative for small practices is their own vets working ridiculous OOH shifts to cover the emergency work. If the dog stays in then someone needs to be on site the whole time caring for them, it simply isn’t sustainable (or legal) for many to do. If that wasn’t the case then owners would face far higher bills to pay for a team of OOH vets to support then routine hours vets

This is a 13 vet practice over 3 sites , ooh for each vet surely wouldn’t be too unreasonable. Vets always used to cover their own ooh , my now retired vet said the problem was nowadays many newer vets just didn’t want to do the hours .,

 

[MurphysMinder]

My vet doesn’t have out of hours cover either sadly (they are a small local practice). However the referral vet I took Jack to when he was very sick do. They’re 40 mins away, so should the need arise Daisy would go there for treatment.

It’s not so much the travelling, the vets I am with now are 35 mins away , it’s the moving a sick dog back and forth each day.

 

[blackcob]

I work for a corporate with their own OOH, that is also contracted to provide OOH for several other practices. Although I strongly dislike the corporate model and even more strongly dislike the pricing, even if I didn't work here I don't think I'd be able to jump ship to an indie because they will almost certainly outsource their OOH. As it happens the hospital is less than 15 minutes from me but some of the contracted practices could be nearly an hour's journey.

The (small) benefit of dedicated OOH care is that you generally get a team with at least a special interest and experience, if not also additional qualifications, in emergency and critical care. I would also hate to see a return to the old model of having animals 'hospitalised' which meant in kennels with someone dropping in last thing and first thing, not proper round the clock care. Equally, the situation you describe is completely wrong.

 

[ester]

I think it’s unusual that the first vet did have services on a Sunday in the day to do the op, maybe if not it would have had to be done at the OOH and not so much moving around. I understand the moving around for OOH on hospital cases is fairly common these days.

Agree with blackcob in that it does means you are seeing emergency specialists if ooh is contracted elsewhere.

I doubt it’s financially viable for them to have ooh at all 3 sites, especially if mostly just hospitalising rather than any big procedures. Some vets will also be ok to do OOH but they are going to want to be adequately compensated for 12 hour night shifts with often sole charge.

 

[Mynstrel]

Our independent vet outsourced ooh a good few years ago, as we found out when we had a dog with a spleen problem. He stayed ooh Friday night in case anything happened, then we transferred to ours for surgery and then back too ooh for the weekend. Although it wasn't fun for us, the dog came through it ok and I couldn't knock either practice on the care, our vets operated on a Saturday morning and when he was feeling better on Sunday night and singing to come home somebody sat with him all night as he was fine if he had company, and the care he had when he was in there was better than any human hospital. That came to about £1700 but that was about ten years ago and we are up north so I don't think our bills are as high as some.

All that said, our vet has now been taken over by one of the big ones and the ooh now is a hospital which is far better. When we had to go recently with a guinea pig I was very impressed. Although we were charged a lot for the consult (about £180 I think), they didn't charge for PTS which for late Saturday night seemed very fair.

 

[planete]

The alternative for small practices is their own vets working ridiculous OOH shifts to cover the emergency work. If the dog stays in then someone needs to be on site the whole time caring for them, it simply isn’t sustainable (or legal) for many to do. If that wasn’t the case then owners would face far higher bills to pay for a team of OOH vets to support then routine hours vets

The alternative is for small practices to cooperate with others near by to cover each others' OOH as is done in some other countries.

 

[MurphysMinder]

I think it’s unusual that the first vet did have services on a Sunday in the day to do the op, maybe if not it would have had to be done at the OOH and not so much moving around. I understand the moving around for OOH on hospital cases is fairly common these days.

Agree with blackcob in that it does means you are seeing emergency specialists if ooh is contracted elsewhere.

I doubt it’s financially viable for them to have ooh at all 3 sites, especially if mostly just hospitalising rather than any big procedures. Some vets will also be ok to do OOH but they are going to want to be adequately compensated for 12 hour night shifts with often sole charge.

Their weekend appointments are centralised to one site , location I imagine depends on which vet is covering.
Things may have changed now but my daughter as a newly qualified vet did quite a bit of locum work at ooh places with little back up from
Senior vets , in fact she turned down some places as she didn’t feel competent enough . Hopefully they do all have experienced staff nowadays .

The practice I’m with now have dedicated night nursing staff but the vets cover on rotation.

 

[MurphysMinder]

The alternative is for small practices to cooperate with others near by to cover each others' OOH as is done in some other countries.

My previous vets used to do this until other practices joined the big groups

 

[paddy555]

our vets are independent. The horse vets provide their own OOH cover and as they are all good vets we always get one we know and trust. We also get passed onto a horse vet within minutes if we have to ring for help in the early hours.
The small animal side, also independent has it's own hospital. I took a dog there at 3am, the vet turned up 5 minutes after I arrived and there was a nightcare vet nurse who "lived in" over night and checked/treated the animals.

They seem to be a very popular and successful practice. They keep expanding adding more practices (new one's not take overs) so there must be a call for the service they provide. On the horse side they seem able to attract good vets (fairly young ones) who do their OOH shifts. I guess it is the same on the small animal side.

 

[AmyMay]

It’s not so much the travelling, the vets I am with now are 35 mins away , it’s the moving a sick dog back and forth each day.

Yes, I understood that. I was just explaining what my ‘back up plan’ is if needed.

 

[Jenko109]

A relative took on an elderly dog. Think she must have been about 16. A labrador type so an old, old dog.

After about six months she got pyo. Was a friday evening. The local vet told her that she would have to bring the dog back on Monday to be operated on!

Given the age of the dog and as she had other ailments, she was euthanized instead, however wtf!? Come back on Monday!?

When mine broke her leg, the surgery was not until the following day. The vets wanted to leave her alone at the surgery overnight on IV painkiller or whatever. Of course I was absolutely not happy with that, so I had to drive her 40 minutes to the OOH vets to be looked after overnight and then drive her back for her surgery in the morning.

 

[honetpot]

I always ask what active treatment they are giving, I have only ever had one stay in for three days and it came home in a right mess.
Would rather be there when they have something done, our nearest OOH is about 20miles away, fortuately I have never had to use them. No one wants to do OOH, and I can understand why, staff as always is a problem.

 

[Highmileagecob]

For a small practice, doing their own OOH work is a security risk these days. If the cat needs OOH, my corporate practice sends us all round the houses, or we can go to a practice eight miles away who works 24/7 and will see anything anytime, (for a fee) and then refer back to your original vet. Thank goodness my equine vet does his own.

 

[rara007]

The average small animal practice is struggling to cover daytime shifts let alone the night cover. Positions sit open for years. A good proportion are on the edge of drowning.

In my first job a weekend meant working Friday ‘normal’ shift, Friday night sole charge cover (staying on site) with an assistant, Saturday with another vet for a few hours then back to sole charge until Monday came. You could be sure the phone would go just as you took your own dog for a leg stretch or got in the shower. Then Monday morning heading off to a branch to do another ‘normal’ day before getting Tuesday off. Any case that needed regular or constant monitoring made this totally unfeasible and unsafe. As an hourly rate it was well under minimum wage.

I give much better care now my job is almost exclusively OOH.

Oh and yes that first practice was broken into a few times (with 2 young female staff on site). We have the police for something most weeks, and we’re very much commuter belt southern uk, not the bronx!

 

[Boulty]

I work at a former independent now corporate who were an early adopter of providing OOH care to other local practices. (Think we spent rather a while riding a wave as the most common OOH providers didn’t seem to want to attempt to set anything up nearby)

Our arrangement has always been that the patient can either stay here for the duration and us do everything needed or if stable they can go back to their own practice during the day. Back in the day when we covered virtually every practice in the surrounding area I’d say about half actively wanted them back, some left it up to the client and some actively did NOT want them going back & forth. We don’t cover nearly as many now for various reasons (some have set their own hospitals up, some got forced to use somewhere owned by the same corporate as themselves and some now use a local referral centre that opened a few years ago instead… we changed some of our T&Cs post Covid as some places we covered for were consistently asking us to see routine stuff for them when they were supposed to be open and we wanted to put them off doing this… sorta backfired / worked a bit too well!) and the vast majority of the time they do just stay here now unless the client doesn’t want to (usually for cost reasons as we are considerably more expensive now than some of the places we cover… we only used to be moderately more expensive)

For the majority of independent practices it just isn’t sustainable for them to all cover their own OOH as usually staff don’t want to work all day then all night then all day on a regular basis. (It’s also not particularly safe tbh although I’d say it’s still relatively common in mixed practice as in most areas there’s not really anyone offering farm & equine OOH cover in the same way as happens with small animals) Hospitalising patients without having dedicated night staff on site (or having someone just check in on them a few times a night) leads to situations like a patient being sat in their own diahorrea for hours or pulling a catheter out and bleeding everywhere then being sat for hours like that or if they deteriorate unexpectedly it could sadly lead to them dying if there’s nobody there to see. Having someone there & awake all night performing hourly checks is quite rightly expensive. I have heard of independent practices that are local to each other sort of banding together & taking it in turns to do everyone’s OOH cover which is more sustainable and easier to staff but would still lead to a lot of back & forth for owners I’d think.

Anyway in my long and rambling post I’ve yet to actually answer the sort of unasked question about why these things happen. Basically some (not all) specialist OOH providers basically rent another practices building for the night / weekend period and then fill it with their own staff. The OOH provider doesn’t really exist as such during the day and their staff aren’t contracted to work during the day either. The building will then be given back to whichever practice uses it during the day and their staff. They may have the capacity to look after one or two patients who are too poorly to be moved but not to hang onto and look after absolutely everything that was in overnight as otherwise they wouldn’t be able to treat their own patients. Hence any animal stable enough to be transported back to their own practice will be.

Would advise anyone concerned about this to look into who provides the OOH cover at the practice they use and what the arrangements are for situations where the animal needs to be hospitalised. (This information should be freely available from your vets and hopefully will even be on their website) Always a good thing to know anyway as it’ll make things that little bit easier in an emergency if you already know where you’re going to have to go and roughly how to get there.

 

[druid]

I chose my OOH service specifically because it is a large specialty hospital which will keep the animal for any period required and do all diagnostics and surgey on site with correct monitoring. They also have a dedicated OOH team not someone trying to stay awake and make decisions after 24h without sleep.

 

[Clodagh]

I always said I’d never go to a vet that doesn’t do OOH. But I have ended up with one that doesn’t. But the OOH place is large, and the dog could go there and stay there if need be. The transporting stuff back and forth is ridiculous.

 

[ycbm]

The vet I used to use has a really strange situation. They aren't the OOH vets, but the OOH vets move into their hospital when they are OOH.

So when my ginger got killed in the road last year I was called from my old vet's number by an OOH person who wasn't with the practice, and charged OOH fees of nearly £100 to dispose of an already dead roadkill cat.
.

 

[KEK]

I’ve never had to do after hours (as in night time, certainly work weekends and public holidays), and I’ve been out for about 18years. Thank goodness as I suspect I would no longer be a vet if I had to work all day then all night :/
Here, we have big emergency centres that are mostly linked to the specialist centres. Properly set up, with emergency specialist vets and able to do everything needed. No way would I be taking my dogs to a little clinic over one of these. We would never ask clients to move their animals back and forth, they stay at the emergency centre as long as needed.

 

[Pearlsacarolsinger]

We stopped using the best local horse vet because his OOH cover for small animals was miles away, goodness knows what happens with equine OOH because that practice doesn't cover equines.
We went back to the biggest local mixed practice. They have their own equine clinic and a small animal hospital which is staffed 24/7.