[liesel]

I actually cannot believe this. I use to take my ratties to a vet in the USA. over the course of my rat liesels life she suffered from a crazy ongoing respiratory infection and altogether cost me $200. that was for months of vet care and tons of medicine. I thought that was insane but after recently moving I now take my rats to a vet in Canada. Brigitta is sick with a respiratory infection, it's not the same as liesels but still I am in absolute shock over the price difference!! To just see the vet and get one dose of medicine it cost me $200. Now because she has the worst luck ever Brigitta also has a mammary tumor at least the vet figures it's probably that. to do a biopsy to prove it's a mammary tumor she wants to charge me $250. that won't remove it, just prove it's what she figures it is. the removal is about $700 with tax. $700!!?? So between her infection and tumor it's gonna be $900 and that's assuming her URI doesn't come back which being mycoplasma it probably will come back eventually so there's another $200. This is insane! Is it like this in all of Canada or just where I live? I have no idea how to afford to save Brigittas life. I'm contemplating road tripping to the States to see my old vet. I called her and she said she can remove Brigittas tumor for $70-$120 depending on its size. That's literally one tenth what they want to charge here, it'd be cheaper to make the trip and pay for gas etc than do it here. What is it that makes Canadian vet costs so psychotic?

 

[Rat Daddy]

It's not just Canada, my area is considered metro NYC and the prices here are actually as high or higher depending on the vet. The receptionist at the top small animal clinic warned me in advance that a mammary tumor removal would cost well over $1000.00 there. An average vet charged about $650.00 but if the rat had to be sent for overnight care at the emergency vets, that would run me another $500.00 or so. Another vet was marginally cheaper, but she told me that the older rats she operated on usually survived the surgery for only about 3 weeks on average... Over $600.00 for a 3 week survival rate was't worth the risk. Our rat survived another 5 months without the surgery.

I hate to say that price plays any part in our care decisions, but when it's a close call... yes it really does. At $120.00 soup to nuts by a vet who had a better track record, for sure we would have given surgery a go.

 

[liesel]

Really? That's interesting. I guess my old vet really just did have amazing prices! Never realized how blessed I was then. I'm hesitant too with this surgery because again it may not even work. I don't remember the exact statistics but there's a good chance that the tumor will come back and I mean she's not exactly a baby, being about 1.5 years old I don't think she's got that long before something kills her don't rats only live to be 2 ish maybe 3? that's what my vet said anyway but I have no idea what the average life expectancy actually is

 

[Rat Daddy]

If you had a vet that would remove a tumor for $70.00 you were either blessed beyond words or living in the 1960's and didn't know it.

 

[Smilebud]

Canadian here. I had to pay $300 for a ret with a URI to get checked and given medicine. It was awful. But I've noticed that the more experienced rat vets charge less, they know more and don't have to access multiple information sources.

 

[Millie & Daisy]

I had to pay over $100 the first time I ever took my girls to the vet for a resp. infection. That was just to have them seen and given incorrect dosage of baytril. I found a rat specialist in my area who only charges 19.95 for a pocket pet exam and then whatever the cost of the medicine. Surgeries on rats are also usually $75. I think it doesn't have as much to do with vets in general as it does finding one that specializes in rats because they have rats themselves. I'm blessed to have a veterinarian who has rats and works with a rat rescue in my area. I think that vets who specialize in bigger animals charge a lot more as a whole because they consider rats "exotics" and more difficult to treat. One that refers to them as pocket pets is more apt to be reasonable with prices. Contact your closest rat rescue to see who they use, as they will usually know of some that are fairly reasonable.

 

[DustyRat]

Here in Halifax, it is $85.00+tax for me to walk into their office. Anything like meds is extra. It is $600.00 to get a spay, I don't know about a neuter. Recently I needed some Blu-Kote for my girl and although the local vet hospital sold it, I would need to see the vet before they would sell me any. I was forced to get it from Amazon. I realize these vets need to make a living but their prices are exorbitant!

 

[Amph]

£30 for a visit here, £10 for meds and £15 for steroid injections. That's all I have needed from the local vet so far.

 

[Jaguar]

Vet pricing is very competitive and undercutting (even if it's still a reasonable price) is frowned upon. The CVMA does have a pricing guideline chart, which only members or vet school students can view. I believe the recommended exam rate was $79.70 for 2014. Exotics (which rats are classified as, unfortunately) would likely be more.

I have a receipt from 2010 that states I paid $99.46 for an exam, Baytril, and Doxycycline. So the prices are nothing new.