Among the many emails I get, I am seeing some kinda ick shifts and other worrisome details about the current state of vet med — veterinary medicine. Let’s walk through a few of them and see if we can recognize a pattern. (I’m experimenting with some color blocks to make articles easier to skim.)
For years now, I’ve written about my concerns with veterinary consolidation. And, now this. Two of the biggest providers of online veterinary pharmacy services plan to merge. I don’t think that’s good news for pet lovers or for veterinary hospitals. Full disclosure: I wrote for one of the companies (MWI) for a long, long time (until their new, back then, global corporate overlords gave me the boot).
A famous, longtime writer in the veterinary space who I follow online shared a link to a new site that lets you search for private equity veterinary hospitals in the U.S. and U.K. When the big corporate consolidators, or corporations that own a lot of veterinary hospitals, buy what was once a privately owned veterinary hospital, they often do not change the name of the practice. Until now, it was also hard to know if that big company is actually owned / funded by private equity. It’s affecting veterinary patient care, client service, and even doctor and staff retention and morale. This quick post also includes links to documentaries on the effect of private equity ownership of newspapers and other news organizations.
As we learn more about veterinary consolidation and veterinary non-compete clauses, it made me wonder what happens if people get fired as veterinary clients from a hospital or clinic that’s owned by a big veterinary corporation. If you’re banned by one, does that mean you’re banned by all facilities owned by that company? I asked around and got an interesting answer. Plus, don’t miss a peek at our latest partial litter of foster puppies (3 from a litter of 6) – photos and a video of them playing with Clover. Calling them the Birthday Bunch. Might name them all after CAKE.
After my recent post about corporate veterinary consolidation and my concerns, I got a tip about about the related problems of veterinary noncompete clauses and how they affect veterinarian’s career options. It affects you too, as a veterinary client. Let’s take a look at how and even what the Federal Trade Commission may do about it.
I feel absolutely gutted to learn that yet another veterinary hospital we’ve used for 30+ years got gobbled up in veterinary consolidation. It’s the incredible facility (with doctors and others I consider friends) where we go for emergency and specialty care. When it got bought several years ago by one of the smaller veterinary corporations, I wasn’t thrilled, but I also consoled myself with the idea that at least they chose a smaller one. I imagined them banding together to fend off the veterinary consolidation giants. In December 2022, I learned they fell to the same huge company that also owns the general veterinary practice we use. It seems I cannot escape the long arm of NVA at least until someone bigger buys them too.
