The Vet Tech and Other Animal-Related Job Rant Thread

Describing many of the "not-so-desirable" aspects of being a vet tech made me want to create a place where those people, myself included, can feel free to post the rants and good things that only others that deal with animals (and the humans associated with those animals) can really identify with. I only ask that you refrain from using real names, etc and compromising your oath of ethics.

I'll start with a few of the things I dealt with today:

Mini-rant - A client brought a 6 month old sharpei in for his rabies vaccine and an exam. He has a congenital joint defect in his hocks that has been progressing. The client had purchased a littermate from the breeder, saw this pup at the same time and was told by the breeder that because of the condition, the pup will be euthanized. The client told the breeder that they would take the pup and give it a good home despite it's condition. The breeder SOLD them the pup "at half price".

Bummer - A good client brought her elderly dog for a consultation. She is divorced and her ex got the other dogs. This remaining dog had belonged to her father, who has passed. The dog was had cancer and was failing and she had to make the decision today to have him euthanized. This dog was the only living thing she had left to cling to and with him gone now, I'm afraid if she is going to be able to move on with her life. I really hope another four-legged companion finds it way into her life.

Good News - One of my co-workers tragically lost her 3 year old Golden Retriever on Wednesday due to a brain embolism. A litter of yellow Labs came in today for their first vaccines and health certificates. One of them got to stay as she purchased it on the spot!

Susan this is a great idea!

I would have been upset with the breeder too - there are so many people out there who do things like that.

I haven't worked for a vet for about 3 months now, but the one of the last things that happened that really upset me was when someone came in with their two pet cats. They had them for 16 years and both were still very healthy, just older. They wanted them euthanized because they were trying to sell their house and didn't want to have to clean up the cat hair anymore.
What respect they had for the creatures that have spend the last 16 years giving their lives and love to them.

Too bad it can't be a child-related job rant...

Animal owners suck. Years ago we had this crazy lady who brought in her cat every other week it seemed. Flower the cat was seriously the nastiest little beast I have ever met and required daily fluids and meds as her kidney's had been failing for awhile. We had advised her to allow us to put the nasty cat to sleep but she refused. The cat couldn't eat or drink on it's own and spent his days and nights meeeeoooooowing in pain. Finally we get a hysterical call one evening before closing. Appointments for the day were done and we were busy disinfecting rooms and stuff like that. She thought flower was finally dying on his own and wanted to bring him in right away. I assumed she meant to euthenize him, but no she wanted us to pump him full of meds and fluids to elongate life and his obvious suffering. Our vet did it don't get me wrong, but I can't stand people who allow their animals to suffer for the sake of them going naturally. Then you have owners who never vaccinate their dogs, don't take your advise, and neglect the simplest things like hair and nail trimming. They bring in animals with bleeding body blisters, hair mats galore, and messed up spines and hips from walking on 2 inch toe nails expecting you to cure all. I also hated when patients lost an animal and cried carrying on for an hour. I cried like a baby when we put down my zeus down who I had since I was little, but some people take grief to extreme lengths throwing themselves on the floor and refusing to move when we have live patients waiting to be seen. I feel better now thanks for the good thread, lol. Oh one more...when people call telling you their animal is sick but want them diagnosed over the phone and the medication sent to them err that one takes me there.

Does grooming count. I'm not in the grooming business anymore, but used to be (just a bather/brusher/all around do anything except fully trim them). I couldn't believe how many people neglected their animals. People would come in with these hairy dogs that were so matted it was just insane. Shihtzus, newfies, poodles, etc... Find lots of things in those mats, rashes, infections, even found a marble lodged in a mat. We've had to refer a few dogs to the vet because the mats were so bad we wouldn't do them. And now these doodles are getting ever popular (ugh) and people are buying them because they look "so adorable" but they don't realize that most of them will need regular grooming.

Well, not a vet tech but I do work weekends at the El Paso Zoo and some people there absolutely drive me nuts. Note that the entrance sign to the zoo doesn't say "petting zoo" or "feeding the animals zoo" but every week it seems I'm having to stop people throwing food to the animals. Pop-Rocks to the spider monkeys, fried chicken strips to the Siamangs, hot dogs at the alligators, you name it, it's been done. The worst part is I have to try to be nice about it and explain our animals are on structured, regimented diets and that improper foods can be harmful to them. Usually I get a dirty look or blank stare, like they don't believe me or I've insulted them. Really ticks me off as we've actually had animals die because of this before. Reminds of at the National Zoo when they had a sea lion die unexpectedly and during the autopsy found it's stomach was full of loose change from people "making a wish" and tossing their coins into it's water.. morons..

JNugent said:

Really ticks me off as we've actually had animals die because of this before. Reminds of at the National Zoo when they had a sea lion die unexpectedly and during the autopsy found it's stomach was full of loose change from people "making a wish" and tossing their coins into it's water.. morons..

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I used to volunteer at a zoo when I lived down in madison. They had some change by the seals showing what killed one of the seals in the past.

Now here's an interesting story....

The zoo I volunteered at is a free zoo (one of the few free zoo's left), so one is able to freely walk into the enterence without much notice by staff because the entrance is not manned. There is a sign clearly stating "no pets allowed". One day as I was doing a polar bear exhibit, I seriously saw someone walking their shihtzu in the zoo by all the animal cages. I seriously did a double take because I couldn't believe what I was seeing.

On a side note, one of the polar bears that I saw on a regular basis has just recently been moved to buffalo new york for breeding. This is a wild caught polar bear so it brings in some great outside genetic material (it's mother was shot by someone who had fallen into the den in alaska and unfortunately had no choice but to kill it for his safety...the mother had 2 cubs so the man contacted the us dept of fish and wildlife and both were placed into captivity because they were too young to survive in the wild.)

Oh, the things I could write about the past 7 years....

It's been real slow, and I have been off for a few days so recently...

Rant/bummer: We had some owners bring their cat in for him to be euthanised. He wasn't eating anymore they said and while they weren't going to be present, they were going to stay in the hospital until he was gone. We were in the middle of appointments and procedures and so they were being forced to wait a little bit. This poor cat... He was severely emaciated... condition score probably 2/10. He was covered in fleas, even had a tick, was matted to hell. And he was purring at us, and headbutting us, and generally being an incredibly loving creature. He'd been losing weight for months, but the owners response to the questioning of the weight loss was "He's old so we didn't want to bother bringing him in". And they were angry at us for taking so long because they needed to be at the post office in 15 minutes.

I was so... so angry that I was in tears as I sat with the cat. I didn't dare go up front because I know I would have started screaming at them. I only knew him for half an hour, but damn I loved that cat. Thinking about him still makes me cry.


The stupid: I mentioned Bob... the $6k cheetoh before. Poor Bob was euthanised at 3 months for FIP. Leading up to that though, we got told about how Bob was doing such weird things... like meowing all the time! And eating tacos and sandwiches! ... The way the woman said it though, complete airhead blonde. It was hilarious. "So like, can you believe he ate a taco? I mean a taco! Isn't that so weird? A taco." We've been repeating "A taco!" for quite a while now because it was so funny. Oh, and apparently Cheetohs aren't really cats, they're more like dogs so you can't use cat medicines and protocols on him... you have to use dog stuff. 'Cause they're dog-cats. >_>

The good: A few months ago some people found an old, crusty stray tomcat. They brought him in and this cat was infested with lice. They were falling off of him and he was "crunchy" to touch. uke02: When we tested him, he came up positive for FeLV. These wonderful people *kept* him! He lives in the garage mind, because they have other cats, but they've kept him, got him neutered, and he recently had a dental done. This cat is also super fabulously friendly. They understand the disease, and are doing everything they can to keep him happy and healthy while he still can be happy and healthy.:cheers:


And the "... you can't be serious...":

We had a woman bring in her blocked cat. She was directed to us by my sister in law. Only later do I get to hear from Cathy... That this woman is a lvl 3 Reiki master and she could have cured the blockage herself, but she'd been so busy she hadn't noticed the shift in his energy field. And she cured her neighbor's great dane, who was blind.
>_> People are weird...

Nanci said:

Too bad it can't be a child-related job rant...

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If you want to get technical about it, children are animals and any place where there are 2 or more children together is a zoo, so post away!

Well, it's Saturday morning, and one of the 2 Saturdays a month where the doctor will NOT be in. It's just me and a receptionist. We are close to a full moon, so I'm wagering that I get 8 people calling to get their sick pet in today, at least half of those will call after 11:00 AM, and 5 of the 8 will have been sick for more than 3 days. The calls the receptionist takes will not count towards my personal goal and she takes an average of twice as many calls as I do. Walk-ins will also not count. I will also wager that upon my arrival at the hospital about 10 minutes prior to when it officially opens at 8:00 AM, that there will already be a car in the parking lot that has been waiting since 7:30 AM. I will make yet a third wager that there will be at least 6 clients that arrive during the last 15 minutes the hospital will be open, all wanting medication and/or food because they are completely out and HAVE to have it now. And one of those will arrive while I am in the process of getting my keys in order to lock the front door.

Susan said:

If you want to get technical about it, children are animals and any place where there are 2 or more children together is a zoo, so post away!

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Well, since you say so, we've had quite the problem with two parents and their five year old "animal." The little boy is a pretty normal little 5 yr old, but the parents come to the lie-berry aka zoo aka library, and sit at different ends of the library to work on their laptops. Then their little boy runs wild around the library all day, back and forth between the two, throwing things, taking the DVDs out of the security cases without checking them out, pretending to be an airplane--all typical 5 yr old things. Which would be fine, if it weren't a public library, and his parents weren't ignoring him, and he wasn't left here to run between them ALL day! Personally, if your son is so board he's running through the book shelves knocking books off cause he is pretending to be an airplane, it is time to take him home or to the park.

As far as I know, libraries have rules, and not disturbing others is one of them. Those parents should be told that they must either keep their pet on a leash or in a carrier or leave.

Susan said:

As far as I know, libraries have rules, and not disturbing others is one of them. Those parents should be told that they must either keep their pet on a leash or in a carrier or leave.

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Get back to work. LOL

Do you ever get snakes???

Susan said:

Well, it's Saturday morning, and one of the 2 Saturdays a month where the doctor will NOT be in. It's just me and a receptionist. We are close to a full moon, so I'm wagering that I get 8 people calling to get their sick pet in today, at least half of those will call after 11:00 AM, and 5 of the 8 will have been sick for more than 3 days. The calls the receptionist takes will not count towards my personal goal and she takes an average of twice as many calls as I do. Walk-ins will also not count.

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I was close! I did take 5 calls from people wanting to get in today, and 2 pets had been sick for over 4 days. I probably would have gotten more, but I had to spend at least an hour today helping a sick dog the doctor had seen yesterday, was given some medications, but not everything possibly needed to make it through the week-end. The dog was still sick, almost worse, so I repeated the injections given yesterday, administered SQ fluids and gave specific instructions for the owner. If the dog was not improved by a certain time, they need to take it to the emergency clinic. I'm lucky enough to work for a doctor that trusts me to be able to continue treatments with his "silent" approval.

Susan said:

I will also wager that upon my arrival at the hospital about 10 minutes prior to when it officially opens at 8:00 AM, that there will already be a car in the parking lot that has been waiting since 7:30 AM.

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Pulling into the parking lot right after me, with the pet, and following me into the office before I even have the alarm off counts for this one! It was an established client that knew no one would be there before 8:00 AM! Her dog was apparently hit by a car "last night". "I'm sorry, but the doctor will not be in today." "Can you give it a shot for pain?" "No, I am not allowed to treat an animal without the doctor seeing it." "Well, where can I take it instead of to the emergency clinic?" "I don't know who is open and able to see your dog other than the emergency clinics. You will need to call them and find out (like you should have done before driving here)." "Can I see your phone book?" "OK, give me a moment. (And let me at least clock in, you pain in my rear.)" I go clock in and get a phone book. "Can I use your phone?" "No, I'm afraid I'm not allowed to let you use it." She then writes down the phone numbers TO THE EMERGENCY CLINICs that are not only written on every one of our business cards, but also in huge letters on the front window of our hospital! (Strangles imaginary client and makes rude gesture from behind the door as client goes away.)

Susan said:

I will make yet a third wager that there will be at least 6 clients that arrive during the last 15 minutes the hospital will be open, all wanting medication and/or food because they are completely out and HAVE to have it now. And one of those will arrive while I am in the process of getting my keys in order to lock the front door.

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Nailed this one ON THE HEAD! And one of them was a client we hadn't seen in 2 years wanting heartworm prevention. He came in with the receipts he got from the low cost clinic yesterday, but since the doctor had not seen one dog in 2 years, and had NEVER seen the other dog, I can't sell him any prescription medications. He had to either make an appointment or go back to the low cost clinic for medication. "But they don't carry Revolution anymore. The new dog came in loaded with ticks." "Well, you can purchase a tick control and a different heartworm prevention. Personally, Revolution isn't the best product for fleas and ticks if you are having a big problem with them." "Well, my other dog has never had a problem with ticks before while it was on the Revolution." And he leaves in a huff. (Well, your other dog will probably now have a tick problem, depending upon if you continue to use the Revolution - if you can find a vet that will sell it to you without seeing the dogs - or a better product, and the species of tick you're dealing with.)

And the day topper:

I do the ordering for most of the supplies. I do NOT order general office supplies or pet food. I DO, however, check in the pet food (and enter the inventory into the computer) and put most of it away. I also rotate the stock (most weeks, but sometimes, I don't have time) in "the back". I do not restock the shelves of 4-5 pounds bags of pet food found in reception. I DID have to go through all of that product today because a client brought it to my attention that there was some expired product on the shelf, including the only 2 bags of the specific food he wanted. And I'm not talking that these expired last month, or even in January of 2009. I took a total of 17 bags off the shelf (about 1/3 of the total product out there) with expiration dates ranging from Jan '09 through Feb '08, the majority were Sept '08 (for some weird reason). And almost all of these bags were behind others with better/current dates. Guess who will be getting a lesson in the reasoning behind rotating stock at least every once in awhile?!

I love my job, I love my job, where did hubby put my gun this time, I love my job...

Susan said:

As far as I know, libraries have rules, and not disturbing others is one of them. Those parents should be told that they must either keep their pet on a leash or in a carrier or leave.

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Yes, and every day we explain this--and they apologize profusely and promise to watch him, and claim not to understand the rules, then he goes back to running around and then we tell them to leave and they leave. And then they come back the next day and do the same thing. Or they will say, "I could see him the whole time, he was just being a kid--he wont do it again" If this keeps up much longer they'll be getting a vacation from the library!

Rude parents are the worst. Today at the park the kids and I were playing with my neighbor and her 4 kids. While she was chasing one she left me with the baby who is 9 months old. A little boy comes up who is 3 or 4 and starts touching the baby curiously. I watch but don't say anything at first I figure he is just checking her out. But then he starts sqeezing her and pushes her down from her sitting position. I jump up and explain this is a baby and you have to be soft nicely, but then he yells right in my face "no its not" and pushed her again. I physically pull him away screaming at him "do not touch the baby like that where is your mother". My neighbor hears me across the park and runs over to see this boy throw a rock at her or maybe me(I was holding her by this time). She says sweetie you have to be gentle with babies. He screams don't talk to me do away. She repeats it louder and he screams even louder. We looked around and saw many parents looking in our direction, but no one came over or said a thing. He ran off and we just stood there like WTF? Anyway maybe 30 minutes later I catch my son pumbling this boy and run over looking at him now like WTF. I ask my son why he just punched this boy and he says he walked up and kicked me mommy sorry. It was the same monster and part of me was almost pleased, but I scolded him anyway when out of the blue here comes the boys mom who was sitting 4 ft. from us when he was knocking down my friends baby and yelling at us. She apologized for her son kicking mine, but adds you oughta teach him not to punch like that oneday he's going to seriously hurt someone. I told my kids to go play and asked her WTF her problem was recanting her sons behavior from only moments before towards a baby not even walking. He is a boy and curious he wasn't trying to hurt her and I don't appreciate you yelling at him. They left after that, but parents these days have forgotten the way they were raised. I can't go anywhere without being appauled by some kids behavior and the lack of reaction from their parents is sick. I feel sorry for those of your who have to work with other peoples children...at least I can spank mine, lol!

Thread necromancy, because today was a really bad one.

I've recently begun picking up some hours at a clinic in an area that is not exactly wealthy. It sees cats, dogs, and exotics so I'm learning a great deal and having fun overall. But some days make me really appreciate my main place of work, no matter how demanding, snobby, or stupid some of the clients there can be.

I have never seen so many unaltered animals in my life. I refuse to accept whines about lacking money. The humane society does $15 spays once every couple months. There's simply no excuse to not.

And that leads into the main heartbreak for today.

A 9 year old pit came in with signs of a pyometra. For those who don't know, pyometras (or pyos as they are often called) are infections in the uterus that are life threatening. The safest and fasted curative method is to spay them. And they can be completely prevented. No uterus, no pyo. This wonderful, sweet and tail-wagging pooch had clearly been bred many, many, many times. The owners ended up electing to euthanise because they couldn't afford any diagnostics or to spay her.

It just makes me so very angry at people sometimes. This was a dog that should have enjoyed another 5 or 6 years of life but instead she's now in the hospital's freezer.

But that was far from the only horrible this day.

There was the 3 month old kitten that wandered too near while the owner was constructing something and had a board accidentally dropped upon it. It died in the vet's hands.

There was the year old -zu that was covered in fox-tails, including one in each ear, and was also unaltered and a cryptorchid (one testicle did not descend). The owners did not socialise the dog properly so grooming him was impossible. I brushed out a huge wad of mats and burrs while he was under anesthesia instead. The owners didn't seem terribly concerned about the fox-tails. Hello futured ruptured eardrums and abscesses, and testicular cancer from being a cryptorchid!

There were the two dogs that had been hit by cars earlier in the week and have been staying with us. We had to replace a splint on the one who broke both front legs because he soaked it in urine and legs aren't supposed to bend that way! D: And no matter how steady I held that limb I could feel the bones shifting and grinding.uke02: At least he's getting surgery to repair his legs.

The other HBC should have surgery for his massive open wounds and broken pelvis but the owners can't afford it. He spent the whole day crying unless I was giving him tummy rubs in the cage. He's on some very nice drugs so I don't know how much of that was actual pain and how much was manipulative drama.


And to top it all off, my dog is quite sick even if he isn't acting it. He's got bacteremia and because he went anorexic for a week he's got liver issues. He has so much bilirubin in his urine that it is practically brown and is *foamy* when it lands. But somehow he it not at all jaundiced, the weird creature. He's due to be on marbofloxacin for... oh... 3 or 4 months. *dies*

Never dealt with the tech stuff, but my biggest pet peeve was when people walked into the bunny room, and said something like "I had a bunny once, but it STANK" I want to shake them and say "you are in a small room that contains over 30 bunnies and all you can smell is HAY. It's called cleaning up after your frigging animals, and getting them fixed".

I usually just just gave them an awkward smile, and then half the time they would tell me how their bunny died. The dog got it, it ran away, I FORGOT TO FEED IT BUT I WAS JUST A KID LOL. Ugh. At least most people were pretty cool.

I can relate to the kid stuff. I work at a zoo and surprisingly, the younger kids we never really have much of a problem with. The older kids are the troublemakers. Even the adults. They act like they own the place. Tearing stuff up, throwing food to the animals, being rude to the staff. We even had a woman try to sue us because we didn't have a room where she could nurse her baby. People like that drive me nuts. It's not our job to cater to their every whim.