The Venting Thread

Good lord.. I thought the vet I work for is expensive, but I can't see a dental and two extractions being more than $700 or so

This... not including bloodwork and praying the surgery is only an hour.


although I stand corrected it's 1,174 (+250 for bloodwork) not 1,471.
but still.
ouch.

Do you guys really think I should keep looking and get more estimates?

Sally had a dental with several growths on her body removed and tested and it wasn't anywhere near that much.

Maybe the cost of living up there is just that much higher?

It is very high...so maybe that's it.
WHINEEEE I wanna not live in a city but I really don't.

Holy crap. We do full bloodwork, dental, full mouth rads, fluids, and up to two extractions for $329. Up to 7 extractions is $599.

Why are they charging you a dental procedure twice? I see a "dental procedure moderate with rads" and then "dental procedure oral surgedy"? So they're charging you separately for the dental cleaning and rads, and the tooth extractions? That seems....really weird. And no way would I personally pay that. I just had Gracie and Chloe's teeth cleaned with full bloodwork and rads for $229 each.

I would at least call around...Kastle's emergency surgery (he actually jammed one of his teeth almost into his nose), and had two teeth removed was $600. His most recent having one tooth removed, non-emergency, was only $200. Both were on the outskirts of decent sized cities (Grand Rapids, MI and Knoxville, TN).

Chloe had a dental with a full blood panel beforehand, and SEVERAL extractions and it was around $400. I would definitely shop around.

Honestly I have no idea. They sat me down and explained but it's all kind of a blur I was too busy bawking at the price. I no way thought it was going to be that much.

I need to call around.
This is madness.

Yeah, definitely do.

We have a ton of vets in our city, and there are 2-3 which would easily quote a price like that for what you're having done. There are many more which would quote half that price, and they are still very good vets. The 2-3 I mentioned have HUGE facilities, snipe the best vets in the city, pay them a huge salary and therefore have to charge a LOT more.

One of them sniped my favourite ferret vet. ;__; Owww my wallet.

Well I was coming here to vent about my aches and pains after taking a bad fall off the skis yesterday, but now I get a twofer with money-grubbing vets. Along with how my cat is dying of cancer and friends are making sh1tty insensitive comments about various things, it's been a heck of a week. I don't even know why I spend any time on the internet anymore.

Cost of living is the issue here, i think. $1,500 is a months rent? For a one bedroom? I'm not saying the vet is cheap but definitely take cost of living into consideration. My rent is $550. I would die if my bill was $1,500.... or if my rent was!

We routinely have dentals that are that expensive. I think the area is a huge factor.

I haven't needed to do a dental yet, but I was quoted around $2000-2500 to do a spay, teeth extraction (all of them), and remove one or both of Coconut's (RIP) eyes.

Wow. I paid $350 for bloodwork and dental/excraction of 20 teeth for Billy last year. I couldn't imagine those prices!

I paid roughly $1500 per cat for dentals with full mouth rads, bloodwork, and extractions about a year ago. You have to take into account the area and the expertise.

lol yup, one bedroom...studio in fact. Don't move to the city unless you really really love it :rofl1:

Honestly, I am starting to just think it's a boston thing. I called three private vets and the SPCA vet and all gave me around the same figures.

I love his vet, they are very good at what they do...

what I did not realize when I chose the vet from the top school with the coolest equipment and the fully licensed staff in the nice area with the pretty office is that ummm...
somebodies gotta pay for all that stuff :rofl1:

Yeah that too. Rent for an apartment is about $700-800 and for a 3 bdrm house is around $1000.

I just choked. :yikes:


That, plus bloodwork, would run you about $450-550 max. Maybe even less.

It never hurts to ask around! It looks like they expect the procedure to take 90 mins - that third 3 figure charge is for "additional 30 mins".

I'd also call your vet office when you can listen sans price shock and ask for them to explain the process a bit more. Since he's only a year, I'd also ask if the cleaning part is actually needed or not - they may put that in there because most dogs would benefit from a full cleaning and it may not apply for him.

When Maggie had a 3 root molar extracted (carnassial), her procedure was only about $300 including everything because they ended up not charging me for a cleaning as the vet felt she didn't need one at that point. (That was in a city where rent for a 1500 sq ft single family home was about $1200/mo, too, btw)

Summer's was 9 extractions + full cleaning+ x rays + blood work AND I asked for a different type of drug than usual for anesthesia. It was a little over $600, I believe.