What to expect in a hospice animal assessment appointment.
What an appointment may contain;
- A comprehensive history of your pet’s past and current health issues. A history of your pet’s past and current activities and interests.
- A physical exam of your pet. This may or may not include lab work (fecal/blood work). If you have current lab results from your full service vet please have those available.
- An assessment of the pet’s environment. Does the pet have the kind of walking, eating, resting environment that is meeting his changing needs.
- A discussion about the future. What kind of expectations do you have for current care needs, end of life preferences and post death options.
- A plan of care. This may include some initial treatments and will lay out a future plan. This may include environment changes. You can expect to have monthly/weekly/daily conversations with our team as the disease or illness progresses.
What an appointment will not contain;
- Routine vet work – we do not do vaccines, initial work ups of a disease or other medical procedures that are not included in hospice or palliative medicine.
- Pressure – we do not pressure you to make any decisions you do not feel comfortable with. We may strongly encourage one treatment or another but typically there are many options.
- Judgement – Each person and family has different views on pets and how they should be cared for. Each family has different schedules, finances and abilities that allow for pet care. We fully understand this and all it entails.