Situation with guide dog and vet

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angell1

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so my guide dog has revcently developed some pain when opening her mouth and there is a bit of lump on her head due to some swelling. I took her in to the vet and it was a new doctor at the clinic that I had never seen before. anyways, withouth really doing any testing, she automatically thought it was masticatory mytositis and wanted to put her on steroid medication right away. however, my family and I waere a bit hesitant because it seemed odd for a vet to prescribe such strong meds without even having a proper diagnosis. When we started to voice our objections, she then said we could either choose to do a blood test to check for that particular disease or put her under full anesthesia in order to do ex-rays and a biopsy. we elected to do the blood test because it was less invasive for the dog and she kept going ton about how expensive the other tests were, which, yes, it’s true, vets are pretty costly, but it doen’st matter, money isn’t really the issue. the most important is for my service dog to be treated properly so she isn’t sick and can be comfortable and continue her work. We then asked her if we could do the blood test and then start the treatment after we got the results and she said that was fine.

a couple days later, it seems like someone from the vet’s office contacted the person from the guide dog association to tell him that we had refused to give the dog treatment and had declined additional testing. basically they made it seem like it was my fault but we had discussed with the first vet and she had agreed with what we had said. so then we went back and saw a different vet, he was better and said that there were multiple things it could be and he took a tissue sample, without needingto put her to sleep, which the first vet never told us they could do, and he also gave her something for her swelling what isn’t a steroid, which she never offered either. apparently the tissue sample has some abnormal cells in it which makes the second vet think she may have a tumor instead.

my main question is this, why would a vet prescribe such strong sterioid treatment without testing and diagnosing properly first? i found that rather unprofessional. if you don’t even have the results and she actually has something else, then she is taking harmful meds for nothing. what do you guys think? and please, if you could, say a small prayer for my dog macy. She is only 3.5 years old so i really hope it isn’t anything too bad. i will try to give the first vet the benefit of the doubt and that maybe there was some misunderstanding along the way
 
Hi angell,

It’s good to see you posting! 🙂 ❤️

I’m so very sorry to hear that Macy is having health issues. I will definitely keep you both in my thoughts and prayers. I hope that the Vet can find out what is going on, and that she will be able to get well soon! ❤️

St. Francis of Assisi, please help dear angell’s beloved Macy. Pray for her in her time of need. ❤️

Well angell my dear, it has been my own experience that sometimes different doctors just bring different experiences with them.

I went through this recently myself. I was inspired to say that I wanted to wait and change what we were doing, until the test results came back. We were working with someone different too, who wanted to change our kitty’s diet to a food that had ingredients in it, that she was probably allergic to. I was trying to explain this, to no end.

It turns out that her test results were really good, and that there was absolutely no reason to change anything that we were doing.

I’m glad that you were able to get another opinion, and get help that way.

Sometimes, that’s the best thing to do.

God bless all of you! ❤️
 
Oldgraynare is a hard act to follow after her lovely post, but here goes.
I would never go back to the first vet. She was way out of line, IMHO, especially when she reported you to the Service Dog place.
Praying that your beloved dog recovers fast.
 
thank you oldGraymare2, I really appreaciate it
You’re welcome! ❤️

I agree with Milt, too–and also about you being reported to the Service Dog organization. You weren’t given enough information to act on, to know what to do.
 
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yes, I don’t think I will go back to her either. I think she is someone new, I have never seen her at that clinic before, I just took whoever was available because it the first appointment I could get

to give her the benefit of the doubt though, I don’t actually think it was her who contacted the guide dog school. From what the director was saying, it seems like it was another vet. Not sure why she ended up getting involved two days later but it’s out of my hands out, Technically, the dog still belongs to the organization, so I pretty much have to do what they say now. I don’t want to get in to a situation where they could try to take the dog away.

I simply explained to them that I wasn’t refusing the testing, I was just wary about putting a dog on such strong steroids without being sure first
 
Guide dogs are working animals. It is not uncommon to start on meds while you wait for labs. While it was out of line to report you, it’s very unlikely that the steroids would of done any real harm if only used for a couple of days.

When my 10yo dog who was incredibly healthy developed an ear infection (unusual because she has erect ears) it wasn’t quite clear after a full treatment. We did another, stronger treatment while we waited for labs. It ended up that it was clear but we still finished the treatments (pills and ointments) in order to ensure there wasn’t any antibiotic resistant bacteria lingering.

Dogs are like small children, they can get very sick very fast. If a vet was pretty sure of something I would rather start treatment and be wrong that wait for labs and have a much sicker animal. With dogs, even hours can matter.
 
well, no, she wanted to do the full treatment, which could take weeks or even months. and she said that even if the blood test was negative, she still thought it was that disease and wanted me to do the treatment anyways. the second vet I saw wasn’t so sure, he said there could be a number things with those symptoms
 
There are bad vets. I’ve seen a few who did not give me good advice (I’ve had well over 20 cats in my lifetime so I can kind of tell good from bad advice). And reporting you was really out of line.

If the vet made you uncomfortable, I would go to another one.
 
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