Costs of certain vet charges???

[RyanChandler]

poor kids don't need to be going to those higher end more expensive schools then if they can't afford it. 


Stop presenting the situation as if you 'have' to incur 300k to go to vet school.  That's just not the case. 

 

[chambero]

XBAR -
I'm assuming this is what you were looking at for A&M.  If you include room & board, etc, it adds up to a total of $160K.

http://vetmed.tamu.edu/dvm/future/tuition


Oklahoma State adds up to $118K:
https://financialaid.okstate.edu/costs-veterinary-medicine-students

But kids really should consider something else if their grades aren't good enough to get into the vet school in their homes states.

With any line of business, you have to be a good business person - not just an expert in your field.  Writing free health papers for someone that calls you once or twice year isn't a good business practice.  Everybody else gets paid in the show business, why not vets.

Our vet for the past 15 years or so died unexpectly last year.  We had to find a new vet.  We are using the "young guy" that several people had told us was way too expensive.  He had to do what I considered a fairly major surgery on a show steer that had a castration go bad with infection.  Charged me $75 or thereabouts.  Spent half a day with me fertility testing bulls at our placed and charged around $300.  I think the new guy is great.  People's expectations are often unrealistic when it comes to vets.

 

[Lucky_P]

Ryan,
I'm with you on that point - no one "has" to take on $300K in student loans, and I have to question the judgement of those who do.  Had a former student who couldn't get into a school here in the states, so she went to one of those Caribbean schools; have no idea what her debt was, but I'll bet it was well over $200K - crazy not worth it, in my estimation, but she did it anyway.

But even those students who gain admission as an in-state student are subjected to much higher costs than I was 30 years ago, when my vet school tuition was about $1400-$1600/year (and I was fortunate enough to be able to live at home with my parents all the way through undergrad and vet school, so my 'living expenses' were pretty much limited to what I 'needed' for beer money!).  Even those students attending some of the least expensive veterinary colleges rack up some pretty significant debt.  And, I can assure you that having DVM behind your name doesn't magically confer great riches to your bank account!

Chambero,
Glad you got a good 'new' vet.  There are some good ones coming out all the time - and some that have the potential to be great, with a little experience - and a fighting chance from their potential clients.
And you're right, they need to be adequately compensated.

IMO, vets in the generations ahead of me set a poor precedent by tying income/profit to 'markup' on drugs, rather than realistically charging what their time and knowledge were worth, and writing a script to the local pharmacy.  Physicians didn't 'give away' their services and pay for them by marking up drugs or vaccines by 200% or more; not sure why the veterinarians adopted that model.  In the days of Google, PetMedExpress, etc., folks know what stuff costs, and get POed if ol' Doc charges them $15 for that $2.50 vaccine.  But they'll pay $8.00 for a cup of Starbucks coffee, $1.50 for a bottle of WATER!, etc., and not blink an eye.

We used to charge $1.50/mile(one-way) trip charge and $35 to pull a calf - didn't matter if it was an easy hand pull, or one that took an hour to get positioned properly, or if I had to do a lengthy fetotomy procedure. Or - if I had to chase the cow around the countryside for an hour or so to catch her.
Wouldn't do it that cheap today.  Couldn't afford to.  Don't want to.  I kind of miss the food animal practice part of my early career, but wouldn't go back to it now, unless my life depended on it.

 

[bim1986]

The ones I new that graduated from KSU where all 100+, unless they had parents footing the bill. 

Vet work is tough and finding a good vet that works on large animals is worth their weight in gold.  There is a shortage of vets and most are going small animal where the money is better.

 

[Lucky_P]

bim,
There's absolutely no shortage of veterinarians - and no shortage of food animal practitioners; see details on the AABP study and report here:
http://dairybusiness.com/features/2011-06-23/aabp-report-addresses-veterinarian-shortage-perception

There are areas of the country that are 'underserved', with regard to service by food animal practitioners - but they're underserved for a reason: there's not enough work, on a consistent basis, to allow a food animal veterinarian to survive.
Sure, you may need one to deliver a problem dystocia every 5-10 years, or write a CVI once or twice a year, but if that's all the business they ever get, it makes it hard to pay the bills, and they either leave for an area with a population base that will support them, or move on to companion animal practice. 

I have a colleague who says, "There's not a shortage of food animal vets Monday through Thursday, just on Friday and Saturday nights." 
Also have a friend who makes his living in the cattle business, whose ex-wife is a veterinarian, and she says, "Cattlemen will starve a good veterinarian to death."
I think there's a grain of truth in both statements.

 

[husker1]

All interesting comments, folks.  I support our local vets 100% and am very thankful that they are here.  Just hard for me to swallow certain charges, while others are maybe even too cheap in my eyes. 

Another charge that always gets me is that I live about 1 mile out of town, 1.5 miles from the vet clinic, and our trip charge is $45 every time doc comes out....$45.  To make it more crazy, our doc lives across the section from us and goes by our house to get home....Oh well, it's only money!

 

[chambero]

I'm in a business where the only thing we sell is our time - almost same exact thing as a vet.  By the time you gather your stuff, drive somewhere - even if its a mile away, and get back to work - you've lost at least a half hour.  If you were in your office, you would be billing someone for that time.  Hence the trip charge.  It has much more to do with that lost time than it does vehicle expense.

 

[DLD]

Our local vets will write health papers for free for 4H and FFA kids to go to shows.  For selling cattle, they charge - I have no problem with that.

I am a little irritated at the moment with a $75 after hours fee.  I brought the cow in before 10 AM, vet examined cow and determined calf was dead and said he'd do C-section (twisted uterus) "when he got caught up", which turned out to be 7 PM...

 

[bim1986]

bim,
There's absolutely no shortage of veterinarians - and no shortage of food animal practitioners; see details on the AABP study and report here:
http://dairybusiness.com/features/2011-06-23/aabp-report-addresses-veterinarian-shortage-perception

There are areas of the country that are 'underserved', with regard to service by food animal practitioners - but they're underserved for a reason: there's not enough work, on a consistent basis, to allow a food animal veterinarian to survive.
Sure, you may need one to deliver a problem dystocia every 5-10 years, or write a CVI once or twice a year, but if that's all the business they ever get, it makes it hard to pay the bills, and they either leave for an area with a population base that will support them, or move on to companion animal practice. 

I have a colleague who says, "There's not a shortage of food animal vets Monday through Thursday, just on Friday and Saturday nights." 
Also have a friend who makes his living in the cattle business, whose ex-wife is a veterinarian, and she says, "Cattlemen will starve a good veterinarian to death."
I think there's a grain of truth in both statements.

I guess I have been misinformed, maybe it was a shortage of large animal vets? 

 

[Lucky_P]

bim,
I'm an old food-animal practitioner, but feel fortunate to have been able to escape and be able to watch from the sidelines for the past 20-25 years, as the face of veterinary medicine and animal agriculture has changed significantly.
There have been claims of a 'shortage of food animal veterinarians' for a number of years - but studies by the American Association of Bovine Practitioners and the AVMA have not borne them out as true.

Again, there are areas of the country that do not have service from a veterinarian who will work with large animals - we have several counties in our service area that have no food-animal veterinarians - but, again, that situation has arisen because of diminishing numbers of cattle and producers to the point that there is just not enough 'work' to keep a food animal veterinarian busy enough to survive financially.

Additionally, the generations of veterinarians coming from a farming background are rapidly aging out; farm background is not required to be a good large animal veterinarian, but most kids who grow up in town/city environments are not necessarily going to gravitate to the dirtier, more physically-demanding large animal practice.
Quality-of-life issues also impact the situation; female veterinarians now outnumber males - for the past 20 years, most veterinary classes have been predominantly female.  Nothing wrong with that - my wife is a vet, and many of my close veterinary colleages are as well - and they're competent professionals. 
But most younger veterinarians - male and female alike - are less inclined to work 80 hrs per week, and have their kids grow up without them being a part of their life.  This was the principal mover behind me leaving practice;  I loved it - but someone else was raising our kids, and I had no time available for family life or pursuing my cattle habit.

It sucks, if you need one to help you work through a disease or infertility issue, or deliver a problem dystocia, but you really can't expect a veterinarian and his/her family to tough it out on the brink of poverty just on the outside chance that a producer might call on them once every year or five.

 

[bim1986]

bim,
I'm an old food-animal practitioner, but feel fortunate to have been able to escape and be able to watch from the sidelines for the past 20-25 years, as the face of veterinary medicine and animal agriculture has changed significantly.
There have been claims of a 'shortage of food animal veterinarians' for a number of years - but studies by the American Association of Bovine Practitioners and the AVMA have not borne them out as true.

Again, there are areas of the country that do not have service from a veterinarian who will work with large animals - we have several counties in our service area that have no food-animal veterinarians - but, again, that situation has arisen because of diminishing numbers of cattle and producers to the point that there is just not enough 'work' to keep a food animal veterinarian busy enough to survive financially.

Additionally, the generations of veterinarians coming from a farming background are rapidly aging out; farm background is not required to be a good large animal veterinarian, but most kids who grow up in town/city environments are not necessarily going to gravitate to the dirtier, more physically-demanding large animal practice.
Quality-of-life issues also impact the situation; female veterinarians now outnumber males - for the past 20 years, most veterinary classes have been predominantly female.  Nothing wrong with that - my wife is a vet, and many of my close veterinary colleages are as well - and they're competent professionals. 
But most younger veterinarians - male and female alike - are less inclined to work 80 hrs per week, and have their kids grow up without them being a part of their life.  This was the principal mover behind me leaving practice;  I loved it - but someone else was raising our kids, and I had no time available for family life or pursuing my cattle habit.

It sucks, if you need one to help you work through a disease or infertility issue, or deliver a problem dystocia, but you really can't expect a veterinarian and his/her family to tough it out on the brink of poverty just on the outside chance that a producer might call on them once every year or five.

Nice post.  I do agree, being a vet isn't easy job.  That is crazy that women outnumber men coming out vet school, I always had men vets and thought it would be dominated by men. 

 

[RyanChandler]

Lots of 'cat vets' out there.  There's a vet on every corner around the North Dallas area. 

 

[DLD]

We used to be those producers that only called on their vet every once in awhile.  I grew up doing it all the old school way, we worked all our own calves, pulled about anything that could be pulled, stitched up cuts, etc... And wondered why the cold shoulder when we needed a midnight C-section or even just a bottle of Lute?

We still pull calves, but I'm a lot quicker to take them to the vet now.  We take all of our calves in to be worked, we do more fertility testing than we used to.  Yeah, it costs something, but in the long run it pays off.  We have a good working relationship with professionals who have a stake in keeping us profitable.

 

[Lucky_P]

Females have outnumbered males in the veterinary ranks in the USA since 2009.
Most recent releases from AVMA indicates that women comprise 78% of veterinary classes across the country - and this has been pretty consistent for at least the past 20 years,  but men still predominate the food-animal practitioner ranks,at ~82%.

http://www.veterinarypracticenews.com/vet-cover-stories/women-in-veterinary-medicine.aspx