Thread by @heathersdesk

Vet assistant fact of the day:

How do I know waken to take my pet to the emergency hospital?

What constitutes an emergency?

Immediate threats to life and body that can't wait until the next time you can see a GP, even if it's not your regular vet.

Examples:
*Not breathing
*Not drinking/vomiting/diarrhea to the point of dehydration
*Open wound injuries
*Eating solid or toxic objects
*Heat exhaustion

The "Can't Wait" part of this can be hard to gauge as an owner, especially since animals go out of their way to conceal pain and discomfort as a survival mechanism.

What makes something an immediate risk?

The same things it does for you:

*Blocked airways
*Blood loss
*Toxic/foreign substances in body that can escalate into organ failure
*Unconsciousness

Does it require immediate attention in the next 24 hours, or your pet will die?

When in doubt, you can always call with your symptoms and request a triage to determine if what you have is an emergency or not.

If you go to the emergency vet with something that isn't an emergency, you will often end up waiting *many* hours to be seen. Sometimes just as long as it would've taken you to see a regular vet anyway.

Wait times for these sorts of things at our local 24-hour clinic are about 8-9 hours currently. It will probably be worse over the holiday weekend.

That's because they're taking cases like parvo, snake bites, drownings, heat exhaustion, and injuries/open wounds.

Some people operate in a mode of going to the emergency vet just because it's the only 24 hour clinic in their area and their GP is closed/can't see them same day.

That is not an emergency. That is an interruption to emergency care.

There is a difference between "it can't wait" and "I don't want to wait."

Which one do you find yourself saying to your situation?

That's a pretty good indicator of where your sense of urgency is coming from: your (totally understandable!) anxiety or your animal's condition.