u/harpyfemme

It’s actually SO easy and satisfying, tech of 2 years and I don’t think I will ever go back to intubating cats with a holder. Just learned today from one of my coworkers and it’s VERY satisfying once you get it. Also used the stylet to help with that, which I haven’t used much before. Y’all should try it and that’s my win for the week!

Just wanted to post this here as honestly this was a very upsetting case to deal with, and I’m so tired of incompetent vets somehow just being allowed to do this crap and receiving no consequences.

Took a blocked cat that walked in without a phone call at 7am, I didn’t think we should take it as the doctor seeing drop offs that day honestly makes a mess out of blocked cats (and everything else, he’s not allowed to do surgeries here and we try really only to keep him on appointment basis, we don’t like this vet but feel forced to keep him due to the vet shortage and him being the only other vet we could get with a full license so our owner can have time off), they insisted on taking it.

We go to do this blocked cat, who has blocked 3 times now (4y/o MN DSH), and this vet, we’ll call him A, goes to take out dog urinary catheters when we have sealed tomcat catheters with the stylet and their own packet of sterile lube. Blatantly doesn’t use sterile lube at all despite using sterile gloves and otherwise trying to do things sterilely, and A is terrible at catheterizing male cats and made a huge mess out of this cat’s penis trying to jam it in from way too far away on the catheter, instead of holding it closely with more control. The other tech I was working with who was assigned to this doctor, Q, already had pointed out that A was not doing this sterilely and was using dog catheters instead of tomcat catheters. He was unable to get it in, so our main doctor had to jump in and was able to successfully unblock with the proper catheter.

They also wanted a sample to determine what crystals were present, Q said we would attach a syringe to the catheter and pull from the bladder once it was unblocked so the sample would not be contaminated or diluted with saline. A did not listen and continued to put a lot of pressure on the bladder and then diluted the sample with saline by flushing the bladder with it before collecting, and then was confused why the sample didn’t show crystals when there was obvious sediment in the bowl. Our main doctor kept telling Q to cysto the bladder, and she said she was not comfortable puncturing a blocked cat’s bladder. Our main doctor was getting snippy at this point and she ended up starting to cry because she was angry and frustrated with not being listened to and this poor patient care, and had to go downstairs while I took over monitoring and assisting.

When they removed the catheter, another tech working with me said she heard a pop when they did so, and tried to tell the doctors that she thought the catheter had broken. They tried to palpate and felt nothing. The cat’s owner called back in the morning, and said he couldn’t pee again. I recommended them to go to an emergency clinic as a 4th time reblocking would probably mean a PU surgery was necessary. They went to another clinic, and it was found that there was a piece of urinary catheter still stuck in the cat’s penis, like we had tried to tell them. Q was also very upset about this, and we have gone to our management and said we are not comfortable with taking blocked cats anymore unless the doctor has okayed it, and that we will refuse to do the procedure if A is the doctor because he is horrible at blocked cats and they would legitimately be better off being seen elsewhere where there is someone who knows what they are doing with blocked cats.

Just kind of a vent about fucking awful practice, I guess. But just, wow. We all really hate this doctor and hope he gets fired.

Hi all, just wondering what your guys’ thoughts are on owners who do not want to be present for their pets’ euthanasia. I personally know I would not be able to leave my pet without me to pass, as I know that most of the time they are scared and confused without their families, and I believe it’s my duty to help them pass with love.

But however, I realize not everyone has the capacity to stay with that, and it’s not always uncaring people who are just dumping their pets off at the clinic to be euthanized because they don’t care about this animal. I used to judge them a lot for it, and while that’s not the choice I would make, I try not to anymore. Because we as people who are around euthanasia sometimes daily, don’t always realize that we are using emotional and mental skills that we have been trained on and built up, to deal with traumatic cases, suffering, and death. Not everyone has those skills, and not everyone can be called to sort of be a crisis worker in that scenario. That’s why we are here for them, because we have the skills and emotional fortitude to guide this family and make space for their grief. For some people this would be an extremely traumatic moment in their lives, and their choice not to stay is not always because they do not care. And I also respect people’s decision or thought process that they just do not want to remember their pet this way, they don’t want the last memory of their best friend to be of them dying. And while that’s not the way I think, I respect it, and I have really come around to this more in practice.

Hi everyone, just wanted to see who works HVSN here currently or in the past, and if so how do you feel about it? What do you enjoy about it and what do you not enjoy about it?

I’ve been working HVHQSN for almost a year now, and I enjoy it, but I don’t think it’s for everyone.
any fellow spay/neuter techs pop into the comments!

25F, tech of 2 years coming up next month. Just interested to know what others’ opinions are on this, because it’s commonly asked to me and is a complex question.

So for me, I would say in some ways yes, in others, no. I do think that there can be a lot of joy and fun found in this job, but I do think it’s a special type of person who is able to make this a long term career no matter how much they love animals. Because even for me, I know in my heart that vet med is not a forever career or field for me and that sadly there will be one day where a change will be necessary for mental and physical health.

For starters, most people can’t afford to survive on this pay, for me I am lucky enough to make a fair wage and be living with a partner, but most people would probably say they can’t survive on this unless they have a partner who substantially makes more than them.

And secondly, I find that even though I am paid a fair wage and I don’t dislike my job, it’s just a LOT of work for the amount of pay. Like it just feels like we do so much in just one day, and it cannot possibly be worth the pay that we get.

Thirdly, it can be very very stressful with the working environments of these jobs. Not only clients, but almost every workplace you work at will probably have at least one coworker if not a clique, who is a bully or a mean girl that you kind of just have to ignore because you don’t have a choice if you want to work there because of course management usually will never get rid of these people and they are allowed to continue their behaviour unchecked and drive out responsible, kind, and hardworking people.

Just wondering what y’all’s answer to that question is because it’s often a loaded question for all of us, and I’ve seen so many say that they loved what they did, but they wouldn’t do it again if they could go back.

Mine is a 15y/o Shih Tzu that came in with what had apparently been a cyst that burst, but had now turned into a necrotic wound, because the elderly couple who owned this dog had tried to bandage it themselves and also had left the bandage we applied the first time we saw them too long. The leg was a necrotic mess, stank to high heaven, and was basically just muscle and meat flopping everywhere because the skin and tissue had sloughed. Probably extremely painful, but likely had lost the feeling as she didn’t flinch or cry when we tried to clean the area as best we could. Obviously was an immediate euthanasia, as the only other option was amputation which was not sustainable for a 15 year old dog. Kicker was that their 25 year old grandson had tried to bandage it by also wrapping a rubber band around the leg way too tight.

After we euthanized the dog, the daughter of the elderly couple called in hysterics as her mother had dementia and had told her the dog was doing great just yesterday, and the mother couldn’t remember why they had put the dog down.

So I started at this clinic about 6 months ago, after leaving a highly dysfunctional and chaotic practice where I was the only tech and basically running it myself. But recently I have been feeling that the practice manager does not like me here, despite not really doing anything to her, and not really working together. Today my two coworkers were talking about something, and then the one coworker said ‘oh and (my name) is going to be working- oh (my name) doesn’t know.’ and cut herself off and stopped talking because I was there. And I was like okay cool, so some other bomb that’s going to get dropped on me that is going to ruin my experience of working here. I just feel like the people here are very sneaky. And honestly, I’m trying to put whatever it could be out of my mind, but it doesn’t feel right. I just feel so discouraged with my experiences with vet med, with one practice being completely dysfunctional and chaotic and abusive, and this practice being more functional, but clearly the people here are doing more of the sneaky or snarky bullshit that makes it miserable to work at a practice. And I won’t stay somewhere if I feel that I’m being targeted, because I stayed at my last practice way too long being disrespected, taken advantage of, and abused.