I have one dog who is extremely vet phobic. Just visiting the surgery causes her extreme stress and although not aggressive with the vets it is very difficult for them to get anything useful from any examination due to her panicking.

She has had a problem which has been ongoing for several years. It is not life threatening but it does seem to be getting worse at the moment. She has had in the past all the investigations the vet can do. Xrays, blood tests, medication and nothing has solved the problem.  The vets have been unable to diagnose what the issue is or suggest treatment so we have been just living with it for the last few years.

As the problem is worse at the moment I am now trying to decide whether to take her back to the vets. If she wasn't so stressed then I would, but because of her extreme fear I am reluctant to do so. Also because I don't think the vets will be able to suggest any further treatment or investigations that will help it seems pointless. I hate the idea of causing her such stress when it won't achieve anything, but I also do tend to take my dogs to the vet regularly it goes against the grain not to take her.

What do people think? should I subject her to the stress of the visit for what will probably be no reason? 

If you are concerned enough to think she needs to go then why not phone first and talk through the changes in her condition then it may just be a case of increasing her meds or if they feel she does need further tests or examinations ask for a home visit.

thanks. She is not on any medication for it so nothing to increase. I forgot to say imn my last post that the vet who did the investigations in the past has now left so we would need to see a new vet which again makes it more difficult as they won't know her full history. I will call the surgery to discuss though,

I have seen my vets examining in the boot of the car in the car park for dogs that won't go in, but a home visit sounds like a good idea.

> I have seen my vets examining in the boot of the car in the car park for dogs that won't go in, but a home visit sounds like a good idea.

We usually go in through the back entrance when the vet is ready to see us and when she has needed an anaesthetic she has had the premed in the car and only gone in when the vets were ready to take her straight in to theatre.
I have been mulling over the idea of a home visit but think it would be a bad idea. I know from my dog grooming clients there are some dogs that find the whole grooming process very stressful.            I know of several who have had a groomer that visits the home and grooms them in the house. This can make the dogs very suspicious of visitors and they no longer feel safe in their own home. I think it would be better to keep vets at the surgery so she doesn't have to worry about the dreaded vets turning up at home.

Would it not be an idea to go to the vet regularly, such as once a week, just to sit in the waiting room and feed treats and then leave again?

> Would it not be an idea to go to the vet regularly, such as once a week, just to sit in the waiting room and feed treats and then leave again?

Because she gets so stressed she starts howling and stressing when we get into the car park. She won't eat even the best treats while still in the car in the car park. because of the severity of her phobia I have not tried to counter condition it as the time it is likely to take is disproportionate to the number of times she is likely to have to visit the vet. She is seven now and the last visit involved a very painful procedure so I think it is unlikely that feeding treats would be effective

Could you maybe ask for a mild sedative before you go?  It will either work or possibly panic her more but only by trying it will you find out how she will react to it.  Don't really know what else to suggest.

> Could you maybe ask for a mild sedative before you go?

I have not tried that, thanks will ring the vet to discuss it. I would love to get this issue under control.

I can sympathise with you. i have one girl that is the same. when she was too ill to visit the vet at the begining of the year, he came to my house on a few occassions. she was so much better. then i had to take her mid way though the year. she got herself into such a state she could almost not breath. I said then that i would not take her back, it will be house visits from now on. they would come to the car. however my girl knows as soon as we turn into the car park where she is.
  

> when she was too ill to visit the vet at the begining of the year, he came to my house on a few occassions. she was so much better.

interesting that your dog coped better with home visits as I have been reluctant to try these. I have considered taking her to a different vets but this one knows her history and her idiosyncrasies. I did change vets when we moved house but it only took one visit for her to realise that the new place was still a vet.

> this one knows her history and her idiosyncrasies

In an earlier post you said that they would have no knowledge, as the vet you saw had left?  Although I admit that I was puzzled at the comment, as vets are supposed to do full write ups.

I think I would be going for a mild sedative plus home visit if it happened to me.

Sedative definitely - I've used diazepam on two dogs now (seems to be the go-to drug) and not found it very helpful at all, I'm about to try alprazolam (Xanax) with Phoebe and have heard only good things about it for this sort of problem.  In particular one person I know has just used it for exactly the problem you have and found it amazingly successful with her dog, normally he has to be knocked out for anything at all but this time he didn't need to be :-)

Failing that ask for a home visit - I checked with my vet re. Phoebe and it was an option (for her it is severe car/noise phobia) so might be worth looking at.

Also, what exactly is the probem (well, the symptoms)?  It might be that some of us could shed light on it from experience that maybe your vets haven't had.

I'd also suggest you phone the vet and ask for a sedative you can give before you even go to them. 

> What do people think? should I subject her to the stress of the visit for what will probably be no reason? 

It depends why she is afraid of visting the vets, if it is the process of getting in the car and going to the 'scary' vet practice that frightenes her, then a home visit will be no problem for her.

I get the vet to see my dog at home. Buster hates getting in the car and then is unsettled by being at the vets (a strange place), his temperature goes through the roof from the car journey & the stress it causes him and he gets himself in a right state, so much so the vet can't get an accurate temperature reading from him at the surgery, unless he is left in for a few hours to calm down.

The last time he needed to see the vet, I called the vet out to see him at home. Buster had no issues with the vet examining him at home - he was happy to have a visitor, but then he has no problem with the vet examining him at the surgery, it's just the car journey & the strange place that upset him.

> In an earlier post you said that they would have no knowledge, as the vet you saw had left?

but if we went to a new vet they wouldn't have access to her notes would they?

the vet who treated her has left but the other staff are the same. reception  and nurses and vets that have treated her for other conditions.

> Also, what exactly is the probem (well, the symptoms)? It might be that some of us could shed light on it from experience that maybe your vets haven't had.

she has had a cough for several years. on the whole not bad but does seem to be worse at the moment. It never used to happen when she was excercised but this morning she was coughing so much I shortened the walk. She was fine when we got home though. She has had numerous courses of antibiotics. Panacur in case it is lung worm. x rays, cultures, heart tests. everything the vet could think of but she is still coughing. Sometimes she coughs up some froth  but not all the time. She is worse when wearing a collar so wears a harness for walks.
If anyone has any suggestions then I would be very grateful.

Has she had a bronchoscopy?  Could be chronic bronchitis.  Or allergy tests perhaps?

Also, have you tried keeping a diary of when it happens/gets worse and what you've done with her that day or what she's had?  Remy has an on-off cough, he has for years and the primary trigger is rawhide - he tends to cough like he has something stuck in his throat after having a bit, usually a few hours later, sometimes the next day.  He was picked up as having chronic bronchitis but very, very mild and it just flares up with the rawhide (but so mild it doesn't actually bother either of us).

> but if we went to a new vet they wouldn't have access to her notes would they?

Sorry, missed this.  You can have the new vets ring the old and request that her history be faxed over.

yes she has had a bronchoscopy. and checked for layngeal paralysis. No allergy tests though
I have kept a diary in the past and nothing showed up as a trigger. She coughs every day and it doesn't seem to be related to food. She is raw fed and has had no vacs since she was a puppy. Apart from this annoying cough she is usually very healthy

> I have not tried to counter condition it as the time it is likely to take is disproportionate to the number of times she is likely to have to visit the vet.

The trouble is, you don't know the number of times she is likely to have to visit the vet. There are all sorts of curable but serious things that could happen to her, including accidents, that will be an absolute nightmare for her if you don't try to get her used to the vet. Ultimately, hopefully a long way away, she will probably have to be euthanised, and that is a bad enough experience for an owner without it also being a major drama. If she were mine I would try very hard to gradually get her used to the vet, even if to start with you are pulling into the car park then leaving again. I had a wonderful rescued GSD who was terrible at the vet but I worked with her till she was able to be examined. She went on to have bone cancer which led to a lot of visits and an amputation--all of which would have been impossible if she had not improved dramatically.

At this point, I wouldn't be taking her - herself - to the vet.  I mean, if she's already had a bronchoscopy and/or other procedures to investigate it, and the vet has already tried the obvious things, what is he going to achieve in the consulting room itself with her?  He doesn't need to examine her again if it's the same thing and you're sure of that - he's unlikely to find anything new, there and then.

I'd phone him up and speak to him and tell him it's ongoing and ask what the next step would be and if he can refer you on to the specialist right off.  That will save you one trip to the vet at least.  And then speak to the specialist beforehand and ask if they can prescribe some meds before you take her in. 

I'd also get a DAP collar on her and put her on Zylkene for at least 7 days beforehand.  Have you tried a Thundershirt?

> The trouble is, you don't know the number of times she is likely to have to visit the vet.

This.  I have two here that are very difficult to take to the vet - Phoebe because she is severely car, noise and traffic phobic, and also clipper phobic (my, it was fun getting bloods the one time I have taken her in!).  And Raine, who is fine with all of that but is actually vet phobic, and has issues over being handled - the stress of going to the vet in itself can cause her to be seriously ill with enteritis, and if she were to need handling on top, she would become dangerously ill (it's happened once when she was left at her last vets to be spayed - within a week she'd lost 2kg, started biting and had enteritis so badly that my vet initially thought she had parvo.  That experience has triggered most of her current problems).

The easy thing for me to do - and the least stressful for her - is nothing.  Just avoid the vets.  But I know that if she were to have an accident, or become ill to the point of needing to go, then the last thing she would need on top of that is stress-induced enteritis so with that in mind, I'll be working on slowly desensitising her.  I was trying to start a few months ago but then Tia was PTS at home and that caused the worst bout of enteritis she's had since she was spayed :-( So I've had to hold off for a while but I'll be starting again soon.

Talk to the staff at the practice - mine are happy for me to bring Rai in to just hang around, and they've also said that if I arrange it with them, I can bring her in during a quiet period when there's a consult room free so we can go and work in there with the door open and no vet present, to get her happy in there without her feeling trapped or thinking the vet will handle her.