Cleveland Vet Recommendations

Status
Not open for further replies.
S

sapling

Member
Anyone have a vet in Cleveland they particularly like for feline diabetes?

I like my vet but they seem to cost almost 2x as much as any other vet in town or out I have been to.. I can't figure out why they are so high. I had 3 teeth pulled from one cat and it cost almost $600... that was with no complications and not including the bloodwork done the previous week.

I've considered Animal Hospital, Inc, which has some good reviews online, but I don't really know much about them. I like that they offer "Special Needs" boarding - they seem to be the only place in town that will board a diabetic cat, so it could come in handy in a pinch if my petsitter isn't available.
 
We're in Cleveland. Parma, actually. I used a horrible vet for a while, but they were refusing to switch my charlie's insulin and run acromegaly and insulin resistance tests. So I switched to a more expensive clinic in Parma. It's Bartels Busack pet hospital. It's on state rd. It's an awesome clinic with great people, but a little pricey. Not terrible, but more than my last clinic. They seem smarter about fd than a lot of places. Especially dr busack. Let me know if you want more info!
By the way, BB ran the acro and resistance tests and they were both positive, so that made me even angrier at the old vet!
Claudia
 
I have to admit I don't know what the acro and resistance tests are :oops: I need to read up on that.. so far my vet has been supportive of home testing, but we haven't explored much besides blood curves. I did take her to another vet to get her fructosamine checked one time (because she was being boarded overnight).
 
Acromegaly is a condition that can make a cat resistant to insulin...so they need much higher doses than most diabetic cats. Most cats end up needing about 1u-2u, where resistant cats might need a dose in the double digits.

Is it just the cost of the dental that you're finding expensive with your vet? $600 seems reasonable to me. That's a little less than what I paid for Bandit's dental and he needed 4 extractions. My old vet gave me an estimate of $1300 for the same procedure. I live in a different state, though, so I don't know how that compares regionally. Are your vet's visit and test fees higher comparatively?
 
Ouch, $1300!

I'm finding it high compared to the vets in my old area (Florida) - but I haven't had an apples to apples blood curve done at multiple vets so it's hard to know for sure. It seems like I never walk out the door even for a routine visit without paying $70-$80, even for my non-diabetic cat.

I am trying to dig up the exact cost of a blood curve visit, but lately we've had so much done it's hard to parse it out. May I ask how much a blood curve by itself typically costs?


The highest dose Fluffers has needed is 2.5 units, so she doesn't seem too resistant.
 
sapling said:
Ouch, $1300!

I'm finding it high compared to the vets in my old area (Florida) - but I haven't had an apples to apples blood curve done at multiple vets so it's hard to know for sure. It seems like I never walk out the door even for a routine visit without paying $70-$80, even for my non-diabetic cat.

I am trying to dig up the exact cost of a blood curve visit, but lately we've had so much done it's hard to parse it out. May I ask how much a blood curve by itself typically costs?


The highest dose Fluffers has needed is 2.5 units, so she doesn't seem too resistant.
Click to expand...

I think you'll see that Fluffers will need closer 1u now that her dental's done. :-D

My vet in Ithaca is more expensive than the vet in my old town, but that's because Ithaca is a bigger city than my old town. My dad lives in a small rural city, and he pays even less than I did before I moved to Ithaca). I've found that the more rural the area, typically the cheaper the vet.

If you're hometesting, you don't need to pay for a blood curve because you can do them yourself! I can't tell you how much one costs because I've never paid for one. My old vet told me I needed to start hometesting as soon as Bandit was diagnosed because office curves were useless since vet stress can impact BG, and that they use it as a last resort for people who refuse to hometest because it's dangerous to dose off of in-office curves. You don't need to pay for a fructosamine, either, because if you get your spreadsheet set up you can average out the BG over a period of weeks (even my current vet tried to convince me on my first visit to get a fructosamine test, but when i told her I was hometesting and had a spreadsheet with the data already, she was thrilled and asked for a link to the spreadsheet). When Bandit goes in for visits, she brings her laptop in with his spreadsheet pulled up. Now that he's in remission I just average the numbers on my meter from his biweekly/weekly checks and give her those. I haven't paid for more than an office visit for Bandit since his dental (which is about $50 for a full exam and $35 for a recheck).
 
Actually, that's not true--we did test his liver values a month after his dental to make sure they were back to normal. I can't remember how much it cost, but I don't think it was very much.
 
im in the parma hts area.
i had a bad experience with a place in brunswick but have heard wonderful comments about dr hart in north royalton, ive actually spoken directly to her (i am not a client as of yet) on multiple occasions....we've talked by phone since she said bringing him in would just rev up his bg #'s, long story short was on a bad food not quality food and he started to rise in levels, she had said why pay to come in to get him overly excited.

i plan on getting him in there later this summer, but i know a few people who actually go to her and she is WONDERFUL!
 
My guess is that the further out you get from the higher population density areas and towards the more suburban/rural areas, the lower the vet costs. There'd be a trade off in travel time vs financial cost; there'd be a stress cost to the longer transport.

(I used to live in Chagrin Falls)
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top