OOH

RE: OOH

An On MRCVS — Thu, 24 Oct 2019 16:46:47 GMT

Thanks so much, Arlo. And thanks to all of you who sent me a few words. I do appreciate them and your time. All the best.

RE: OOH

Arlo Guthrie — Wed, 23 Oct 2019 13:06:00 GMT

[quote user="Guy Smith"]I started reading this thread from the beginning, and was quite enjoying it. It's not often I hear like minded voices.[/quote]

If nothing else, thanks for bringing it back on topic

RE: OOH

Guy Smith — Wed, 23 Oct 2019 12:51:47 GMT

I started reading this thread from the beginning, and was quite enjoying it. It's not often I hear like minded voices.

I particularly enjoyed the prophetic:

“No practice HAS to use an OOH provider - I don't like what this is doing to the profession, which seems for all this 'improvement' in working conditions, to be getting unhappier and less liked by the day.“

It was also interesting to read the 2011 “GPC” which I imagine has been seriously revised since Vets NOW have infiltrated the RCVS. You can probably transport sick dogs as much as you like now, but just don't leave a post op GDV to die inbetween checks if you're a small independent practice.

(Even slightly refreshing to see a serious “Hate Crime” against the travelling community admonished with a mere “Oooh naughty”.)

And then I woke up in 2019, and realised it was all just a dream...

RE: OOH

Arlo Guthrie — Wed, 23 Oct 2019 09:08:01 GMT

Um - a tad slow off the starting blocks, but first and most important thing, is that I 200% agree with Dinu Catilina:

[quote user="Dinu Catilina"]This is a pretty benign post, why jump on it like this?[/quote]

Not only benign, but from someone whose first language may not be english (though their post is very well written), and who has explained the reasons why they want to remain anonymous.

BUT

Anon ... don't worry, not a big deal, but it would have been preferable to start this as a new thread, with a subject line that indicates what it is all about ... ie OOH EU vet seeks work. More people will likely see it. I am going to do that for you now, but I'll leave this thread as is, in case you haven't seen the replies.

RE: OOH

Neil Wheadon — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 22:49:49 GMT

Give Vets Now a call. They constantly advertise, offer fantastic training and have sufficient churn that something is always available, the East of England is a pretty big place. There aren't many dedicated OOH, a look at practice websites of 'who does our OOH' may give further leads.

In my honest opinion anyone who wants to do OOH is needed in the profession, the majority of clinicians rely on these folk.

Neil

RE: OOH

KathW — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 21:02:42 GMT

Hi Anon, I hope that you find what you are looking for in the world of work. I'm sure Arlo will advise you on whether you should start a new thread for your post.

I can understand that you probably want to be anonymous for now as you don't want your present bosses to know that you are actively looking for work. That can sometimes make things difficult at work. It may also be the that you are not supposed to know about the changes that are about to happen at work or that the wider veterinary profession isn't supposed to know (e.g. early stages of a corporate buy out).

It's always a difficult situation because as soon as you apply for a job you have to reveal your identity and the veterinary profession is a small one where there's often someone working at the place you apply for that knows you or someone who has worked with you. Word can get around very quickly. I read once that someone applying for a veterinary job and going for an interview has more to lose than the interviewer. Having said that applications can and should be kept quiet in the early stages.

If you have 7 years experience of working in the UK you will be very much sought after in the present veterinary employment climate. Have you tried looking at websites for Vets Now and any veterinary hospitals that provide OOH cover in East England to see if they are advertising at the moment?

What else would others do in Anon's situation

RE: OOH

Dinu Catilina — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 20:45:23 GMT

The anon post has been abused several times in the past with some really nasty comments from it. This is a pretty benign post, why jump on it like this? Jeez Louise

RE: OOH

Joyce Whitehead — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 20:06:50 GMT

Arlo Guthrie

RE: OOH

Sarah Keir — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 19:36:12 GMT

This is inappropriate use of the An On account. "Arlo Guthrie"

Also posting on a thread that is 8 years old and nothing to do with your post is odd. I suggest you repost under your real name in the correct place otherwise, you are unlikely to get any replies!

RE: OOH

An On MRCVS — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 13:42:55 GMT

Hi, all,

Due to some changes coming soon at my work place I am seriously considering moving elsewhere. I rather approach you directly than through an agency.

Basically I'm an EU vet with 7 years experience working in the UK, of which 5 years have been on night shifts. Ideally I am looking for continuing working on ECC and OOH night shifts in East England, although I don't mind travelling further if accommodation is provided. What I do mind is a life-balance rota, and a friendly environment with team player colleagues is my priority.

For now I would prefer to remain anonymous, as you all can see, but feel free to send me an email on oohvet@gmail.com to have a chat.

I hope you all have a nice day and

Re: OOH

Louise6732 — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 22:03:03 GMT

[quote user="Mark Hedberg"]accuse us of "not enjoying our job[/quote]

I don't enjoy my job when owners ask me to work miracles with next to no money! We had a stray cat brought in last week, cat was a state, old, advanced periodontal disease, mass on lip, very underweight. I advised the 'new owner' of the consult fee, and estimated £200-300 to sort out it's nutrition state/fix mouth etc. Her reply 'I have no money, I'm on benefits' My reply 'well then sign the cat over to someone who has the money to provide it with the care that it needs' SHe asked 'won't the RSPCA pay'? I ended up PTS the cat as its owner appeared - I gave her a stern talking to about the state of the cat. Sigh.

Re: OOH

Mark Hedberg — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 21:03:20 GMT

And if we get sick of getting taken for a ride, they accuse us of "not enjoying our job". ('twas a post on here somewhere...) Can't understand why we might not enjoy being taken for fools? :)

Re: OOH

Utlendigur — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 19:21:50 GMT

We have a client who usually uses our local RSPCA clinic, but uses us when they're shut or the dogs need surgery, xrays etc. She has I think 5 or 6 giant breed dogs (St Bernards, Mastiffs) on her records of varying ages including very young dogs. She's on benefits, says she's disabled and has no transport. I saw her a couple of weeks ago when she brought in a 2yr old mastiff that had been anorexic and not drinking for a week, and vomiting for 2 days. The dog was 10-15% dehydrated, abdo pain and seriously ill (ended up pts after ex lap), and should have been seen at least 5 days earlier - which is what I told her. Her excuse was that she phoned the OOH service but couldn't afford the visit fee - but that was the previous evening, she'd failed to bring the dog in to us, the RSPCA clinic or the RSPCA mobile clinic that calls in her village in the preceding 5-6days. As this isn't the first time she's left a dog because of "no transport" or "no money" (the one before this died at home in similar circumstances) I pointed out that if she is determined to have giant breed dogs she needs to consider transport and money issues. Her response was to burst into tears and say I was being nasty to her

Re: OOH

Bob Russell — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 15:58:57 GMT

[quote user="Clive Ansell"]

[quote user="Bob Russell"]

The Shar Pei puppy we had in last week (entropion and hernia plus owners wishing to breed from her) is now registered with the PDSA! Good luck to them!

[/quote]

I hope you neutered the thing?

[quote user="Bob Russell"]

The newly registered disaster Bulldog from last week is now registered with the PDSA!!

Don't you just lov' em!

[/quote]

One of the reasons I do very little charity clinic work now, I started getting really p***ed off with benefit claimants rolling in with >£2000 puppies and driving 4x4's. It should be a requirement of registration that these are neutered, it is at one of the RSPCA clinics I worked in recently.

[/quote]

Nope did not neuter it (still 10 weeks old) but made it clear I would not repair the hernia without neutering. Oh it had the start of skin problems as well!

Both sets of (ex) clients were taking the p**s. Is it just me or are most owners of these expensive deformities expecting the PDSA to pick up the pieces? If neutering was compulsory at the PDSA the situation would resolve well within one generation of dogs.

Re: OOH

Clive Ansell — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 12:46:34 GMT

[quote user="Bob Russell"]

The Shar Pei puppy we had in last week (entropion and hernia plus owners wishing to breed from her) is now registered with the PDSA! Good luck to them!

[/quote]

I hope you neutered the thing?

[quote user="Bob Russell"]

The newly registered disaster Bulldog from last week is now registered with the PDSA!!

Don't you just lov' em!

[/quote]

Re: OOH

Bob Russell — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 10:45:25 GMT

The Shar Pei puppy we had in last week (entropion and hernia plus owners wishing to breed from her) is now registered with the PDSA! Good luck to them!

The newly registered disaster Bulldog from last week is now registered with the PDSA!!

Don't you just lov' em!

Re: OOH

Vet2Vet — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 22:44:46 GMT

' As for the'travellers/pikies/gypos, just need a large bottle of blue juice. If there is any left bump off any sick dogs too. '

Oooh , naughty !

Re: OOH

Mark Hedberg — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 20:21:41 GMT

edit: nevermind. 15 is a good one and I will tattoo it to the wall.

Re: OOH

bob lehner — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 19:19:33 GMT

[quote user="Robin Grimmer"]And Wynne what is your specific part of the GPC that you say is contravened by transporting animals to the OOH service?[/quote]

GtPC - Part 2 D

Continuity of care in veterinary practice

9. Once an animal has been accepted as an in-patient for treatment by a veterinary surgeon or practice, responsibility for the animal remains with that veterinary surgeon or practice until another veterinary surgeon or practice accepts the responsibility.

10. Primary practices and out-of- hours emergency service providers must provide uninterrupted treatment of an in-patient, if it is considered that the animal is not fit to be moved.

11. Where an animal needs continuous in-patient care, a veterinary surgeon should not leave the animal until appropriate care is provided by a suitably qualified (eg MRCVS or Listed VN) colleague.

12. It is recognised that critically ill animals will sometimes need to be moved in order to receive appropriate treatment and primary practices should have appropriate transport and transfer arrangements in place. This may necessitate trained staff travelling with the animal.

13. When considering the transfer of critically ill animals, veterinary surgeons should consider the long term care that may be required and avoid, so far as possible, the need for such animals to travel more than necessary.

14. Where it is necessary and appropriate to transfer an animal between the primary practice and an out-of-hours emergency service provider or vice versa, the responsibility is that of the veterinary practices involved, not the client. Normally, the practice from which the animal is transferred is responsible for the transfer or arranging the transfer.

15. The transfer of a critically ill animal between practices should be in the animal's best interests, not for the convenience of the practices involved.

Re: OOH

Clive Ansell — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 18:26:50 GMT

[quote user="Martin Atkinson"]

[quote user="Clive Ansell"]

I have a patient in today; 12 month old SBT hemorrhagic diarrhoea and vomiting and a positive diagnosis for parvovirus, dog very sick and certainly needs IVFT and supportive care. the practice closes at 1930 and is not staffed until 0830 tomorrow. Clients have no money and no transport and have declined an ambulance transfer to Vets Now tonight for ongoing care (which is my advice). other options are keep here on the basis the premise is unstaffed, send home (although clients brain donors so not willing to send home with drip line in situ and needs IVFT as ++vomiting), or PTS. The only practical option is keeping overnight here.

what would you do?

[/quote]

After many years of this sort of dilemma my philanthropic approach to these is exhausted. My approach is If you can't afford/don't want to pay for treatment here or elsewhere the animal doesn't get it. Take it home and treat it yourself or have it PTS. Even keeping it in overnight unattended is a nightmare when you come in to 2 feet of parvo diarrhoea its not worth the aggro. Having a large 'travelling community' (sounds more polite than pikie camp) nearby this situation arises quite commonly.

[/quote]

I'm not there yet, but I'm catching up with you PDQ! I seem to have had a run of them this week; expensive pedigree dogs, owners no money and/or unwilling to spend it anyway and think that the world owes them free and discounted treatment because they are on benefits. An aggressive Shar pei and equally agressive owner this afternoon, needs massive entropion surgery, no money so offered pts for fifty quid - didn't go down too well.

As for the travellers/pikies/gypos, just need a large bottle of blue juice. If there is any left bump off any sick dogs too.

Re: OOH

Martin Atkinson — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 17:55:44 GMT

[quote user="Clive Ansell"]

what would you do?

[/quote]

Re: OOH

Bob Russell — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 16:33:35 GMT

I am happy to let people know what I would do for my own animals even if this means not treating. I try to be 100% honest to myself about it. If anything I would probably run that pre-anaesthetic test for my own animal that I would struggle to justify to a client on clinical grounds. I am just nosey and want to know what the bloods are saying!

Again I am happy to tell owners this. They often then request bloods!!!

Re: OOH

Sarah Keir — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 16:21:52 GMT

Hi All,

When I was a new graduate, which was not too many moons ago (9 years in fact), I thought nothing about leaving animals in the practice overnight unsupervised, even on IVFT. I gave them a check at 10pm, but that was for my piece of mind, not required by the practice. The crux is that the clients didn't expect anything different and there was certainly no OOH providers at that time in that area (far north-west).

I now work in the deep South of England, and the practice is slowly changing over to a OOH provider. However, they want me to work an extra 4 hours a week to take away my one night a week on call (I only get called out half a dozen times a year for about 45nights on call). What gets my goat is the clients down here call you out for the most minor things that really can wait (e.g. sore ear at 11pm, been going on for few days) but then are will to pay the enlarged call out fees that are supposed to put them off calling the vet out! No winning either way!

Sarah

Re: OOH

Hannah Wynne Richards — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 14:41:52 GMT

Of course I also (if necessary ) fluid load during the day, or give s/c fluids,but I assume so do the people who will leave an animal alone in the surgery overnight I also assume the ones left alone are those for whom it is essential that the iv fluids continue overnight. I'm not pretending that sending them home on drips is ideal-that's why I won't do it without getting the owners to sign a disclaimer which clearly states that they were urged to hospitalise, together with reason for refusal (usually financial-but that's their fault for not having insurence-not mine ) It's definitely inferior treatment, but I'm positive it's better than being left on a drip in an empty surgery-and would defend that view, either in court or in RCVS

Wynne

Re: OOH

Rob Loxley — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 13:48:48 GMT

[quote user="Clive Ansell"]

One issue of OOH centres I am unsure with is where does veterinary and clinical responsibility begin and end?

[/quote]

AFAIK it's much like referring any case for treatment: you should be aware of the details of where you are sending it and make these clear to the owners.

[quote user="Clive Ansell"]can the client come back and whine at me if the OOH vet does £2000 of unnecessary investigations? [/quote]

Again that comes down to communication between you, the client and the OOH provider. We make it clear what treatment we plan for the animal to recieve, if we want (or not) further investigations doing, whether we expect it transferred back in the morning, and what has been discussed with the owners. Obviously not everything is set in stone but if as much as possible is discussed then the room for problems is less.