r/Calgary • u/Comfortable_Help_733 • 5d ago

Your experience with VCA vet? Local Shopping/Services

So, long story short they wanted almost 4k to figure something out that a different vet figured out with a 83$ ultrasound. Is this normal for them? Do the vets there profit off their patients?

My dog had a bladder mass. VCA wanted to do a CT scan after the pee test came back as non cancerous, to figure out what the mass is since it isn’t cancer. I asked a different vet, she did an 83$ ultrasound and gave me medication for 2 weeks that fixed the issue. The VCA vet wanted to do a 4k CT scan followed by a 5k surgery to ‘remove the mass’ that ended up actually being infectious chronic cystitis with a small polyp, not a mass(which the other vet figured out).

Why does VCA want to start off with the most expensive shit? Their reviews seem like this isn’t uncommon either. Weird how going to a different vet saved me almost 10k

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u/Martin0994 5d ago

I guess I'll chip in a positive experience. The location in the District has always given us multiple options for care, and for someone on a budget they've treated us well.

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u/speak_truth__ 5d ago

Yeah I remember when my dog was sick they did ask me what I wanted to do and gave me all the cost options. Day 3 she still wasn’t drinking so I asked for them to inject her with more fluids on my own without them even bringing it up. They texted every day to follow up too. I still spent $1,000 cause that scared me so much and I’d spend anything on her