Customer Reviews for Deer Run Animal Wellness
Bob on 9/8/2013 7:39:10 PM
I am writing to you as my wife and I have grave concerns about the service and care given to our pet, Ernie (a 12 year old cocker spaniel) at Deer Run Animal Wellness Center in Midlothian, Virginia.
On Sept 3, 2013, Ernie had surgery at Deer Run Animal Hospital to remove a massive abdominal tumor. Prior to taking him to Deer Run, we had taken him to Crater Road Animal Hospital in Petersburg and Centralia Animal Hospital in Chester. The vet at Crater Road, Dr. Deborah Kinney-Nay, strongly advised against surgery because Ernie had a serious heart mummer (grade 4). However, her stepson at Deer Run, Dr. Marc Nay, agreed to do the surgery.
The week before the surgery we had in initial consultation with Dr. Martin at Deer Run. After performing an EKG (costing around $450) on Ernie his inclination was that he was a good candidate for the surgery in spite of the heart mummer. He estimated the surgery would cost about $1000. When we arrived on Sept 3 we were given another estimate ranging from $1456 to $1836. The final bill after the surgery turned out to be much more than the initial estimate. It was $2379, well over the estimate.
On Sept 5, the doctor from Deer Run called and informed us that Ernie was ready to go home. My wife and myself were extremely happy to hear this and then went to Deer Run to take Ernie home. When they brought Ernie out, he was walking fine but then immediately started to collapse on the floor. Dr.Martin said he was just weak and also the floor was slippery. After collapsing like this, we were fully expecting them to keep Ernie for further observations, but instead Dr. Martin carried him out to our car. After about 10-15 minutes of driving, he stopped breathing and died! They should have kept him in their hospital when he started collapsing in their office.
We really believe Dr. Nay should have concurred with his stepmother and refused to do the surgery due to his serious heart condition and age. For such a very expensive medical procedure, we were not expecting to have Ernie die 10 minutes after getting him back from Deer Run.