One lunch special to go please.

They are crawling out of the woodwork today.

My RBB just told me one of our clients phoned and needed to speak to me. Apparently this client was completely irate that when her husband picked up her dog after boarding, the dog was not sent home with a package of our house diet so that she could transition him back to his regular food slowly. No amount of explaining that this was not standard procedure seemed to calm the client down, and the client was apparently insisting on a prescription for the house diet, which the client could take with her elsewhere, because heaven forbid she ever give us one red cent ever again.

I did pick up the phone and call this client, but unfortunately (can you feel the sarcasm??) got voicemail. I left the following message:

Hi, this is Dr. VBB calling about Fluffy. I got a message that you wanted a prescription for our kennel diet. Unfortunately, I can't write a prescription for anything for Fluffy without examining him. We do feed Food X here at VBB Hospital and you are certainly welcome to purchase that from the food vendor of your choice. I wonder if perhaps there was some misunderstanding regarding Fluffy's dietary status, or regarding your request, because no one has ever made this kind of request in the twelve years I've been here at VBB Hospital. Please give me a call back at 1-800-VBB-HOSP if you have additional questions or concerns.

Either the client has no additional questions or concerns, or is not interested in addressing them, or has not gotten the message because we have not heard back.

I am also the 1%. Or maybe the 86%. It depends.

I just wanted to put that out there, seeing as how certain people keep saying that the VBB are not representative of 99% of practicing veterinarians, or some other totally bogus, made-up statistic.

Since I'm posting pics, I wanted throw something else out there for you guys:

This textbook has over 1000 pages, and you know what? I have read them all. I like to read, I like to learn, and I knew *before* I went to veterinary school that "Jim down at the feed store" was telling his customers that vets don't learn anything about nutrition. So, next time you hear someone telling you that vets don't learn anything about nutrition, please check and see if THAT person has read all 1000 pages of this textbook, or similar, as well as attended lectures and small group discussions with veterinary nutritionists, and so on.  Just check into that for me, ok?

Do you really want nutrition info from the pet food store?

Really?
Now, I'm not saying some people in the pet food stores aren't educated about nutrition but I doubt that most are. What percentage of pet store employees do you suppose have a 2 or 4 year degree in animal nutrition?
I have an idea, the next time someone from a pet food store starts talking to you about nutrition, ask them to show you their degrees and certificates about their nutritional or animal health education.
I've never worked in a pet store, or pet food store. But I am highly suspicious that most of the recommendations made are due to current promotions by the manufacturer and are NOT based on your pet's health needs. I can easily buy the idea that the highest profit food may be pushed by the management. I'm just guessing here.
So I get upset when I make recommendations for a pet's diet, which may or may not be something I sell, and the pet store person suggests something else. Really, you want to match my 2 bachelor degrees and my Doctor of Veterinary degree as well as my licensing and 20 years of experience and continuing education against someone that isn't even 20 years old yet?