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Comment by cruffle_duffle | Hacker News Reader

> The opinions I trust the most are the doctors that have previously told me that no treatment is necessary and the problem will resolve on its own.

This applies double or even triple for vets. There is a lot of cash to extract from pet owners who would “do anything”, no matter how unnecessary or ineffective, for poochy.

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I don't think this is charitable. I've been lucky to have a view into the back office of a veterinary clinic and the fact of the matter is it's just difficult medicine to practice. Every vet I know works hard to save their clients money.

If pet owners are inclined to take the "do anything" route it can open a lot of doors. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Was this a PE owned vet clinic? They're much more common today and the practices have slowly become more predatory.

I've known a few people who worked in vet clinics, and they've all told me horror stories of how pets are mistreated. I'm talking left to sit in their own feces and urine overnight, fixed when they weren't supposed to be, injured during surgeries and then not communicated to owners.

That’s a good point. I’m unsure how to frame my observation in a way that makes vets look like they are intentionally doing something wrong. I guess what I’m saying is when I work with a vet it’s hard to know if the vet is going overboard with diagnostics and tests because me, the owner, want to “do everything I can” for my pet.

It’s a tricky subject to phrase correctly and way to early in the morning to come up with a good example.

I just can't reconcile this with my experience. The most charitable I can be is that these vets care deeply about the animals but treat cost as no obstacle or don't even recognize the cost.

>> If pet owners are inclined to take the "do anything" route it can open a lot of doors. I don't see anything wrong with that.

How about just like people-medicine: diagnostic tests when there is no likely treatment should not be proposed. Or charging 20-50x the generic cost for the same drugs humans use? The fact that some people will "do anything" when there's nothing that can be done is prone to abuse.

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