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Important Background Information Welcome to Natural Pet Animal Hospital. We are a unique hospital offering integrative medical and surgical care to dogs, cats and exotic animals. Because of the specialized services we offer to our clients we are very busy. Our goal is to provide the best service to you and your pet while maintaining the needs of our established clients. It is also important to us to be available for other new patients seeking our services. To avoid misunderstandings, please read the following information so you are aware of our policies and procedures. When you call with questions about your pet, receptionists and technicians are trained to answer questions and relay messages to and from the doctors. If you call with a question for the doctor, it will be relayed to her and a receptionist will return your call with a response. If you prefer to consult directly with the doctor, we recommend scheduling a quick appointment to go over your questions. Doctors are usually not available to personally answer your questions as they see patients back to back all day. The doctors may ask you to call in a few weeks with an update report. The receptionist will record the information and pass it along to the doctor. If you have bloodwork, test results or procedures done at another hospital please have the results forwarded to us to keep your medical record up to date so the results can be discussed at your next appointment. Because our doctors believe in proactive care, we must be in touch with your pet’s recent medical history and be kept abreast of changes in your pet’s response to our protocols as well as overall health changes. Once a maintenance protocol is achieved, we require your pet be seen for an appointment every 6 months to review medications. If your pet is not on maintenance medications or a formulated protocol, Illinois law states an annual veterinary visit is required to maintain an active veterinary-patient relationship. If we’ve not seen your pet as an appointment in over one year from the date of the original examination we will inactivate your file and assume you have sought care elsewhere. The frequency of rechecks and the potential to do some updates via phone consultation is based on the severity and duration of your pet’s medical issues. In some cases, the doctors may feel comfortable with a phone consult after your first visit, however, in many cases they need to physically see the pet to determine if changes in the protocol are warranted. If we are monitoring changes in bloodwork, you may elect to have these tests completed locally and have the results faxed to Natural Pet. If you have sought care elsewhere for these testing procedures, please note that the test results will be added to your file and discussed at your next consultation, via phone or in person. On occasion, once a protocol is established for a previously addressed medical issue, clients ask to have bloodwork or test results completed at another hospital reviewed by Natural Pet doctors and recommendations made without a follow up appointment. In these situations, there is a fee of $30.00 for the doctor to review the case and interpret new test results. These cases are usually reserved for people that do not have extensive questions about test results, as her recommendations will be relayed through a client service representative. If you are an established client and have follow up testing completed at another hospital and would like to discuss Natural Pet doctors recommendations, we have phone consultation time slots available weekly. These consultations are billed through your credit card. We are happy to be a primary care provider for those clients that understand our hospital’s unique approach and adhere to our outlined policies. Because we do not offer emergency services and have limited business hours, many clients maintain an active relationship with their current primary care veterinarian and also consult with our vets. We encourage this. Please be aware that Natural Pet is not an emergency hospital and cannot provide adequate emergency services. We recommend you have an emergency clinic lined up for your pet prior to actually needing their services. Although it is our goal to offer you the soonest appointment available, there may not always be an opening available. We recommend you have an established relationship with a local emergency/after hours/urgent care facility for these situations. Because of the volume of patients our doctors see, they are not available for non-client consultations. We require a 24-hour prescription refill notice. Under special circumstances, prescriptions can be filled with short notice for a nominal fee. Although very rare, Natural Pet Animal Hospital can refuse to accept clients or patients and can refer these clients elsewhere. We also reserve the right to terminate the veterinary-client relationship at any time and refer these clients elsewhere. You may, of course, seek veterinary care elsewhere as well. We can fax your medical records (24 hour notice is required) free of charge or photocopy your records for a fee. If you need to cancel your appointment, please notify us 24 hours in advance. Natural Pet Animal Hospital understands that missing appointments is sometimes unavoidable. However, empty time slots mean another waiting pet was denied that time with the doctor. There is a $50.00 no show fee after the first missed appointment. Due to
the abuse of credit, Natural Pet Animal Hospital requires immediate payment for
services rendered (If you have an estimate for services, a deposit for the
estimated costs is expected). |
