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I'm crossing my fingers so hard for you. Apparently our bfs were talking about their Missouri plans together yesterday. In the meantime, I couldn't resist stirring the poo poo pot again about cats with lower urinary tract signs getting diagnosed with presumptive UTIs. I really should stop commenting on these and leave it alone but it bothers me SO MUCH.
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Feb 21, 2016 19:09
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Never give up the fight, because as soon as you do, it means either you a) don't care or b) agree. It's also entertaining to read.
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Feb 21, 2016 20:52
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Most clients are good people and I'm thankful for that but drat, the bad ones sure makes me want to punch a wall. Someday, it will feel so sweet to be able to tell someone that they can gently caress off and deal with their problem themselves since clearly trainer = DVM. Fuckin' horse people.
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Feb 22, 2016 00:48
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You know, a couple years without clients doesn't actually sound too bad now that I think about it. After a year on Long Island and a year in LA I think it'll be a welcome respite.
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Feb 22, 2016 06:04
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Not gonna lie, this whole not dealing with the public thing has been really great. After having to do MRIs on a family of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels last year where they couldn't touch the ground nor be leashed and had to be carried at all times and dealing with crazy breeder lady... yeah, this is good. She claimed she had been working Chiari out of her lines and was talking about how she was the best blah blah... All three females had it pretty significantly, though we couldn't do the male because she wouldn't let us clip for a catheter and I refused to place a catheter without clipping (because gently caress taking that risk with a show dog), so she refused to do the scan. When we gave her the results she became oddly quiet...
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Feb 22, 2016 06:56
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Dealing with VINners is a different sort of crazy, I think.
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Feb 22, 2016 18:08
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I appreciate the person look that VIN gives you into the mindset of your average veterinarian. I also enjoy some of the unique crazies, like the guy who is really into neurominidase inhibitors and thinks they're a cure for everything. Just got an email from him asking for funds to do research into using them to treat various infectious diseases. He is adamant that they cure parvo, despite all of our research saying that it may make a difference in early days, but does not help once clinical signs have set in. I can't begin to imagine the amount of bias that will be in that paper if he ever gets the funds.
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Feb 22, 2016 19:16
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Sekhmet posted:Dealing with VINners is a different sort of crazy, I think. Very true. Luckily for the most part those who need rad evals are pretty level headed. It's not like I need to steward over the Trenches or Issues and Arguments :p: And yes, VIN is also a great place for crazy people to have their little soap box ground.
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Feb 22, 2016 22:35
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HelloSailorSign posted:Never give up the fight, because as soon as you do, it means either you a) don't care or b) agree. Well technically I haven't examined the animal so I reeeaaallly shouldn't say it but it really just drives me crazy. Less than 2% of cats with lower urinary tract signs have a UTI. And then people just put them on antibiotics, and it gets better, but really, it's a condition that resolves with time. Ugggggggggggggggh. At least now I'm in cardio and don't have to really deal with this anymore except when people post about it on SA! Funsies.
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Feb 23, 2016 00:47
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HelloSailorSign posted:Not gonna lie, this whole not dealing with the public thing has been really great. After having to do MRIs on a family of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels last year where they couldn't touch the ground nor be leashed and had to be carried at all times and dealing with crazy breeder lady... yeah, this is good. And she immediately spayed all her breeding stock. Right? Right? This never happens
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Feb 23, 2016 01:12
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Don't pretty much all Cavalier King Charles Spaniels have the malformation anyway? Kinda hard to breed it out if every dog of the breed has it.
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Feb 23, 2016 02:21
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Arsenic Lupin posted:And she immediately spayed all her breeding stock. Right? Right? This never happens You know in your heart the truth. Actually I heard some vague mumblings about debates over payment for the whole thing which was hilarious. Apparently there is some group trying to breed it out. I don't care enough about Cavaliers to keep that information in my brain. When I was last on cardio (oh 4th year) I had the 60 year old client hit on me - owned dozens of rabbits and a dog (we were seeing the dog). She says, "I like your hair - it's got that Native American look to it and I just love that. You know if I was 30 years younger I'd be all over you." Needless to say, I was amazingly
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Feb 23, 2016 04:51
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Hey I just found this and I thought I would share. Being a medical nerd, I'm really into the app Figure1 where (human) medical staff show interesting cases and ask questions. Turns out there is a similar app for veterinary medicine. It's called Viralvet. Dunno if it's on android or not. It's free to sign up and check out cases.
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Mar 28, 2016 06:38
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Here's this for interesting: I had a patient come in for a recheck today who happened to develop atrial fibrillation during the 3 hours between when I examined it to when I did the echo. Talk about serendipitous.
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Mar 29, 2016 03:00
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Braki posted:Here's this for interesting: I had a patient come in for a recheck today who happened to develop atrial fibrillation during the 3 hours between when I examined it to when I did the echo. Talk about serendipitous. I had one of those a while back under GA. The surgeon went 'oooh hey what's this adrenal mass here' *poke* and the heart rhythm and blood pressure immediately all went to poo poo. As did the seat of my pants.
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Mar 29, 2016 03:16
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There's the difference. It's an "oh poo poo" situation for you, it's an, "well, that's lucky, we can start you on diltiazem before this pushes you into heart failure" for me.
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Mar 29, 2016 06:54
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Lava Lamp Goddess posted:Hey I just found this and I thought I would share. Neat looking app. Sounds kinda like the VIN message boards.
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Mar 30, 2016 00:05
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That app is pretty cool. I showed my girlfriend (also an LVT) and she spent the better part of an hour flipping through it. Anyone else at AAHA in Austin? I didn't even think to post here to see if anyone was planning to attend.
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Mar 31, 2016 17:55
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Not Grover posted:Anyone else at AAHA in Austin? I didn't even think to post here to see if anyone was planning to attend.
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Apr 3, 2016 00:45
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Crooked Booty posted:I am! But I live/work in Austin so I didn't have far to go. I think this is the first time there has ever been a big national meeting in Austin so that's cool I guess. Cool! This is the first national conference I've been to and I have really enjoyed it so far. Saturday was ECC day for techs so that was my jam all day. My email is notgrover at gmail if you want to say hello tomorrow. My girlfriend and I are both down to earth non weirdos, I promise.
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Apr 3, 2016 05:17
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No conferences for me this year; way too expensive. I did go to ACVIM last year which was a blast.
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Apr 3, 2016 16:28
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I was thinking about doing PacVet this next go around as it's in SF, but decided against it.
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Apr 5, 2016 16:04
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IVECCS 2016 for me!
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Apr 5, 2016 21:16
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I submitted poo poo to aaep and ACVS,which is the only way I'll be able to attend either of them. I have a good chance at aaep, I think. I don't really understand what I submitted to ACVS (lots of human medicine moonspeak), so kinda hope that they reject it lol
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Apr 5, 2016 23:52
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Vet students are now asking me for letters of recommendation.  I guess I grew up?
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Apr 6, 2016 23:06
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Apparently the AVMA is partnering with a loan refinancing company and promoting that company for use in student debt. Oh and if you refinance you can't use the income-based repayment systems. My initial response was mad... but I'll calm down until AVMA talks about why they're doing it.
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Apr 11, 2016 22:58
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HelloSailorSign posted:Apparently the AVMA is partnering with a loan refinancing company and promoting that company for use in student debt. Most professional societies are in it for the big guys and not in it for the majority of their members: as a chemist, ACS (american chemical society) told me and my peers non stop in undergrad we needed PhDs! There were not enough PhD chemists! Now that I have one, ACS is advertising middle and high school teaching jobs to PhD chemists. It has been very funny and its also why I'm not a member.
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Apr 13, 2016 00:01
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The AVMA are a bunch of crooks and they're probably making big bucks in commission for it.
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Apr 13, 2016 00:35
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Yeah, that's my first thought especially given some of their previous actions. Supporting the LMU/Appalacia study? Yeah, that was bullshit. Putting out a campaign about how things aren't that bad but not dealing with the biggest elephant in the room, student debt? Yeah, that's poo poo. Allowing an explosion of new schools who don't have enough of an ability to train their own fourth year students? Yeah, bullshit. Oh yeah, and they tend to cost more than the schools with academics (except Penn, wtf is that?) Also funny that their PLIT costs more and doesn't give as much coverage as some other PLIT groups... yet you have to be a member to partake in it.
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Apr 13, 2016 22:47
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Not surprised that only ~6% of the responders of the non-anesthetic dental poll think it's actually therapeutic.
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Apr 20, 2016 18:36
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Lava Lamp Goddess posted:Hey I just found this and I thought I would share. It is on Android and it's awesome! Thanks for sharing!
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Apr 22, 2016 06:00
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crosspost from dog thread: full disclosure: I'm not a dog person. I've got a friend of a friend who's dog I personally witnessed get hit by a car. The dog is doing fine now and recovering miraculously well but the vet bills are around $5000 for a lot of ball fondling and turn your head and cough bullshit. Would it be feasible at all to negotiate a lower bill? I know people talk about negotiating skyrocketing human healthcare bills all the time
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Apr 24, 2016 09:48
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Alan Smithee posted:crosspost from dog thread: Get an itemized bill if you can. If the dog was hospitalized for any length of time, it's possible that's what's driving the bill up. If the dog was kept for passive observation, it's possible that maybe you could bargain them down.
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Apr 24, 2016 10:52
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That post honestly reminds me of something that's been bothering me a lot lately. I keep seeing stuff on the news about people whining about how vet bills are so high and we're trying to scam people. Never mind the average vet's debt load or the fact we're making maybe 20% of what an MD would make. I thankfully don't deal with owners and we don't have much room to modify our costs because of what we are. How do you guys handle it when an owner comes to you complaining because the dog you've busted your rear end to save and worked long hours for has a high bill?
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Apr 24, 2016 15:16
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My girlfriend's insurance was just billed 1600 dollars for a blood panel that in veterinary medicine costs about $180. But goddamn do people look incredulous when we tell them that price. It's kind of maddening.
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Apr 24, 2016 15:58
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I spend half my days chasing money. I regularly have people spend in a day more than I make in 3 months then complain to me that they have to mortgage their house to pay. I typically answer that that is why I don't have a horse, it's outside of my means. So instead they all make gofundme accounts to mooch money, which offends me on a base level. Literally all my medicine patients last week had a gofundme for minimum 4x more than their actual bill. People are unbelievable. Horse with a 2500 bill currently has a pity party gofundme for $25k. Now that makes my work look like a real crook because clients are saying we are charging them $25k when we aren't.
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Apr 24, 2016 16:13
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Solis posted:That post honestly reminds me of something that's been bothering me a lot lately. I keep seeing stuff on the news about people whining about how vet bills are so high and we're trying to scam people. Never mind the average vet's debt load or the fact we're making maybe 20% of what an MD would make. I thankfully don't deal with owners and we don't have much room to modify our costs because of what we are. How do you guys handle it when an owner comes to you complaining because the dog you've busted your rear end to save and worked long hours for has a high bill? I make an estimate before nearly all cases for everything beyond the exam. Even then, sometimes people sign estimate they have no intention of paying, and we get screwed anyway. This doesn't eliminate the complaining about cost, but it does put it more in the realm of "I can't afford that, what's a cheaper option" and less "you've busted your rear end to save my dog and now I think the bill is too high." Emergencies definitely still suck--lots of trying to figure out what needs to happen right now and am I ok giving that treatment for free if the owner balks at the price once I have time to make the estimate for things I've already done? As for how to deal with the complaining, I try to sympathize with their stressful situation (sometimes not even really about the cost, just their pet being sick, or their new baby coming, their divorce, whatever) and if we haven't done anything yet, I do my best to come up with a cheaper option, which the client is usually grateful for even when we both know it is far from the best option. Sometimes they just need to hear someone agree that yes, this is a lot to pay (usually unexpectedly) and to understand their situation, even if they can't do much about it. We try to keep medical and financial stuff separate, and not have the doctors involved in the financial. The techs present estimates, not me. If a client is upset about how a case was handled medically, I can discuss that with them, but if they are upset about money, that's that's the practice manager's territory, not mine.
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Apr 24, 2016 21:33
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We're very upfront about costs - our hospital is set up similarly too in that doctors really don't have to deal with the financial aspects if they don't have to, but my boss finds it that people respond more positively when she does. Can't afford x-rays and blood work today? Well, ok, let's prioritize the echo, and then later you can get it done with your regular vet because they're probably cheaper. Can't afford the echo? That's not ideal because it gives us a lot of information, but based on the physical it's proooobably this, later on you can get the echo done at any point, just let us know. Your dog's hospitalized for CHF and you can't afford another night? Well, he has improved... I think it'd be ideal to keep one more day but based on what I see it's reasonable to take him home if you can keep a close eye on him. Based on the radiographs we took and the signalment we know the most likely cause of the CHF, so let's skip the echo and prioritize the money for treatment. Sometimes we're real softies and discount things for sad stories (disabled war veteran who got a dog with a severe congenital heart disease and couldn't afford the echo... we discounted the echo heavily). We look for ways to save them money and tell them - hey, don't buy sildenafil from us, take this prescription and go buy the generic, it's way cheaper - and I think it helps them realize that we're not trying to scam them. We break down the diagnostics and do a stepwise approach and if they can't afford it then that's ok, we'll just do what we can within reason. People have been pretty good about it generally.
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Apr 25, 2016 02:53
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Lareine posted:Get an itemized bill if you can. If the dog was hospitalized for any length of time, it's possible that's what's driving the bill up. If the dog was kept for passive observation, it's possible that maybe you could bargain them down. thanks, I know posting that came across adversarial and It's not my intention to make vets the bad guy. I'm kinda stuck in a position of not being emotionally connected with said dog and thinking "yeah, maybe that rescue dog that didn't understand car = bad" wasn't such a good while still wanting to help the owner despite not being "directly" responsible because his roommate was the one who gave me use of the property
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Apr 25, 2016 09:15
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It's a sensitive point for a lot of veterinarians because the general public doesn't understand the cost of medical care and thinks that vets make tons of money - it's constantly brought up negatively by clients (and all over the drat internet) and makes vets feel like poo poo. If they're dealing with one of the corporate vet groups, they'll likely have done an estimate or a ballpark figure and have a signature on it - they'll point to that and say, "pay this, you signed it." The privately owned can be forgiving or not, depending on how clients have screwed them in the past with promises to pay. But yes, an itemized bill is amazingly important as the first step. If they've got $500 IVC placements, then that's bullshit. If there were minor complications that required monitoring to make sure it didn't get worse, repeat imaging procedures can add up really quick.
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Apr 25, 2016 15:49
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