Vets......rant!!

B

Bozzy

Well-Known Member
Joined
10 April 2006
Messages
1,025
Location
Nr Newbury, Berks
Visit site
My boxer has come down with kennel cough, caught from a friend's 3 dogs who picked it up from their neighbour. He's been showing slight symptoms since Sunday but got quite a lot worse over night and is now quite under the weather.

So I phone my vets hoping they'll let me pick up some antibiotics, they've seen him about 6 times over the past couple of months due to other issues so I thought (or hoped) it wouldn't be a problem not to have to see him.

Oh no....they want me to take him in so they have the pleasure of charging me £25 (or whatever the consultation fee is) just to tell me he has kennel cough - arghhhh!! I'm sure there are very good reasons why they HAVE to see him but it's just so frustrating, especially when I'm so poor. I remember my horse vet used to take my word for it and let me pick up various drugs for minor infections etc. I'm currently horseless but is that still the case in the equine world?
 
To be honest I 100% agree witht he vets as although frustrating, they would potentially have a legal nightmare on their hands iff they just took an owners word for it. I think it would probably be illegal and certainly not ethical (maybe unless the client was themselves a practicing vet) even then, iffy! We constantly had our dog in with a knocked up toe ( a common and minor injury in running breeds) and would phone ahead and tell our vet our suspicions and could we have a course of Rimadyl, they always saw our dog and we were always right however, it might have been something worse and we are not vets!
Hope your dog is better soon!
 
I think I am right in saying that kennel cough isn't treated with antibiotics, it is a virus. Frustrating as it may seem, they really shouldn't prescribe without seeing your dog, any more than a doctor would.
 
Unless the Kennel Cough so to say goes down into the lungs and cause pneumonia, antibiotics will do as much help if you give them to your dog with Kennel cough as if you just flush them down your toilet. So buying antibiotics would also have been a waste of your money and the vet's that does give antibiotics to dogs with "usual" Kennel cough, only does so to comfort the dog's owners who wants pills to cure their dog.


Hope your dog gets well soon, in average it takes 7 to 10 days (whether with or without medicine).
 
we cant give meds without examining the animal. what if it didn't have what you think it has? you'd be the one sueing us for causing more harm than good? is totally not worth our trouble to be handing out meds to anyone who asks for them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top