I'm so sorry this happened to you and Lucky. Years ago, I lost a wonderful dog to a local vet who misdiagnosed her disease. He's a big one on wormers. thinks everything wrong with an animal is caused by worms. By the time I realized she was failing and got her to a good vet, she was gone.
I was devastated and guilt ridden for years. Other pets have helped me past it.
You tried your best. Problem is, vet can say what he wants, his patients are voiceless. Only thing I did was never take another animal to that vet. I don't think a lawyer will help in your case.
Sorry I don't have a better answer for you. - Ellen

bunnyman, please try not to be angry with yourself, you did more for Lucky than most people would have done and you did the best you knew how to do at the time.

In my experience, it's very, very hard to notice or respond immediately and constructively to warning signs and major clues (both about an animal's condition and about incompetence or dishonesty in vets) when you don't know what to look for and are stressed to the max about your furbaby's condition. Been there, done that, too #@%* often...

I have also dealt with both careless and greedy vets. Due to the first our beloved mastiff did not make it through bloat (almost ten years ago and I still beat myself up over it, as well as weep buckets), our rescue mastiff was underdosed with antibiotics for Lyme disease (the vet who corrected the dosage sent a firm, but polite e-mail to the first vet who miscalculated and to the organization who employed said person), and three of our dogs had undiagnosed sarcoptic mange for 3 years (changed vets over that one). Due to greed the guy who diagnosed our dogs with mange undercalculated treatment dosages, and if a young vet in his office/clinic hadn't quietly tipped us off, heaven knows what would have happened (changed vets yet again!)

I'm not a lawyer so I can't offer any informed or constructive remarks about suing. I've heard that negligence is one of the hardest things to prove because you also have to prove intent. Best bet is to check with a lawyer in your state.

If you choose to express your concerns to the vet, you may find it helpful to write a timeline of events that you can refer to during the conversation.

Hope this helps.

I could hardly read your post, because, I get too upset and angry when I read stuff like that.

I'm soooo sorry that your poor cat had to suffer. I took my cat to a vet that abused her right in front of me. He wasn't too nice to me either (downright nasty!).

You get so upset and confused when it happens that you don't have the presence of mind to do anything at that moment. You're entrusting something very precious to them, and, you trust that they're doing the right thing.

When I called the vet's office (it is a clinic in NYC with several vets) later that evening and spoke to the vet who owns the place, she told me that they knew about that a$$hole and that they'd had many complaints. Still, they didn't fire him until many months (and, I guess, many clients and lost dollars) later.

I wish I could tell you exactly what to do. YES, I would pursue it, if only to keep this from happening to any other innocent animals. You could start by contacting animal rights groups, a lawyer, BBB, consumer rights groups, Attorney General, etc..

If this is the owner of the Vets Office that did this to Lucky, you won't get anywhere complaining directly to the vet. What's he going to do? Fire himself? I'd contact all kinds of authorities first (and the lawyer) with a written detailed account of what happened and see where it goes.

Again, I'm so sorry about Lucky.

The first thing that you can do is not beat yourself up over it. Hindsight is 20/20 and you can spot the warning signs in retrospect, but at the time you were stressed and were looking for help, so your idiot radar was out of focus.

The next thing you can do is never take a pet there again and tell everyone that you know what they did to your pet, so they do not take their pets there either.

And lastly, you could detail your experience in writing. Writing it out can help clear your thoughts. You could give a copy of it to your vet, along with a request for a refund on his fees. He may not give you a refund and legally he is not required to. But putting it in writing lets him know your perspective. This may help give you some closure.

Even if you don't give the writing to the vet, just putting it on paper can sometimes help sort out the situation in your head.

I'm very sorry about Lucky too.

But I'm not *sure* that you have a legal case, for several reasons.

One, Strongid is very safe and has been used to cure roundworms in cats, dogs, and other animals for years. I've dewormed hundreds of cats over the last 12 years, and never once has one died. I've never even heard of a cat dying from Strongid. The statement that 1 out of 20 cats die from strongid is simply ridiculous and I'd love to hear where the vet got that information. Plumbs veterinary drug handbook, Papich's veterinary drug handbook, the 5 Minute Vet Consult, and my parasitology profesors all agree that Strongid is the drug of choice to rid cats of roundworms. Yes, it is a labeled for horses, but that is because there isn't a roundworm dewormer labeled for cats. Lucky had roundworms and the proper treatment is to use strongid, so you don't have a case there. Strongid is not one of the dewormers I was referring to in my other post.

The second treatment Lucky had was subcutaneous fluids. Since he had a history of not eating and drinking well for a couple of days, it is perfectly reasonable to give SQ fluids. The issue becomes how much and if there was a medical reason to give less than normal to Lucky. I remember you saying that Lucky was all blown up looking from after the fluid treatment, which makes me think they gave him quite a bit. Normal cats could handle a fluid overload, but was Lucky normal? From what you described, he wasn't walking normally even at the vets (tipsy was how you described it). The question becomes should the vet have given as much fluids as he did given his presentation.

Unfortunately I don't know because I don't know what was going on with him. I can speculate a couple of things. One is that Lucky could have had blunt force head trauma. You don't necessarily see anything wrong on the outside- no bruises or scrapes for example, but he could have had a rather significant blow to the head before you found him. That could explain why he was laying out in the freezing cold in the road, since obviously normal cats wouldn't do this. It could also explain why he wasn't walking normally and why he didn't eat or drink much. Head trauma tends to damage to blood vessels which leads to brain edema. This increases intracranial pressure, and acts just like a space-occupying mass or tumor in the brain. If you then add fluids it leaks through the leaky blood vessels in the brain, making the problem worse. Eventually the brain is squeezed so much that it can't work, and you die.

Another possibility is that Lucky suffered heart damage as a consequence of his hypothermia. He may have been wobbly in his walk because his heart couldn't pump enough oxygen to all his tissues which made him very weak. If you then add fluids to a heart that is barely working anyway, the heart is easily overloaded and you die of congestive heart failure.

Keep in mind that those scenarios were pure speculation; I have no idea what happened to Lucky or why. The one way to find out is to have a necropsy done by a different vet. Unfortunately it may be too late to do this because the tissues decompose quickly and it makes getting a post mortem diagnosis difficult if not impossible.

I don't think it would be a bad idea to get a copy of Lucky's records and ask another vet to look them over. You may be charged a small fee to get the records copied- that is completely legal and expected. And you may have to pay a consultation fee to the other vet.

Things that should be in Lucky's medical record:
1. His history. Anything you told the vet about when and how you found him, where, and what you did to help him should be in the medical record. All your comments about his lack of appetite and drinking should be in there. Anthing you said about him being really quiet and not moving around much should also be included.
2. His temperature, weight, pulse/ heart rate.
3. Comments about his physical exam. The vet should note any abnormalities, such as Lucky's wobbly walk.
4. A differential list or a list of things that could be wrong with him that would explain why he was acting that way.
5. A plan to find out what was wrong. If the vet discussed any further diagnostics that you declined, it should be in the medical record.
6. What he did. It should include the fecal test being positive for roundworms, the dose of Strongid given, and the type and amount of fluids administered.
7. If there was a plan for follow up, that should be in the record as well.

If any of these things are missing, depending upon what they are, you may have a case. You'd have to consult a lawyer who is good at veterinary law. I am certainly not fully versed in all the legalities about veterinary law and certainly not in your state, so things may be a little different there. The problem is going to be proving that the vet did something that would be considered wrong by any vet in that situation. And I'm not sure that you're going to be able to do that.

If you do have questions about the medical record, ask the vet. He probably feels bad about Lucky dying (I hope) and should want to explain what he feels happened. At least, that's what I would want to do. And I would want you to ask me, if I was in that situation. I wouldn't want something to go wrong that was unexpected in the first place, and certainly not something that ended with the pet's death. So I would want to talk to you and find out if there was anything I missed in the history or something that would explain what happened so I could learn something from the situation and prevent it from happening again.

I don't know if Lucky's long term prognosis would have been different if he hadn't seen the vet, or if you had stayed home or whatever. He may have been a lot sicker than you think. Fluids and strongid should not kill a cat, so something had to be seriously wrong with him for that to happen. I think you did as good as possible for Lucky, and that he just may have been one that couldn't be saved no matter what. At least you gave him a chance, and a warm happy home and love for his final days. So many animals never get that chance.

Again, I'm so sorry.

Michael, I'm so sorry to hear this about poor Lucky. Reading over meghane's experienced post - I have to agree that something was seriously wrong with Lucky when you found him.

Please don't beat yourself up - you did your best for the poor guy. Much more than most people would do for a sick cat in the road.

RIP Lucky.

I think joepyeweed had the best idea.
My concern is the vet giving Lucky a wormer in the condition Lucky was in. I did'nt think you would give any animal a wormer untill it has been treated for the trauma it sustained first.Also animals and humans alike can die of fluid poisoning even if it's just water.

You have no reason to blame yourself. you took it to a trained animal health care doctor. It's unlikely you can do anything to the Vet except don't take another animal there and spread the word.

Do write the letter as jpw said even if you don't mail it.
vickie

So sorry about the cat and your concerns. Please heed the advice here about not blaming yourself. It is very likely that he would not have survived without the treatment, so all your care was important.

You made his last days comfortable and safe. You gave him love. You cannot have done more.

Yes Lucky had injuries... he was found in the road during a nasty winter day. My best having picked him up was that he fell from a vehicle. They will climb up on a recently operated engine for the heat when it gets cold like that. Most exit or die when the engine is started again. Death in the fan was common until car makers began to make it more difficult for small animals to get in that spot.

Records! Yeah... after two corrections they don't even have my name right at the vet's office. It is very possible the vet did nothing wrong and perhaps impossible to prove. It is fact the vet did not have success. I know I saw the cat picked up one handed and not supported. To do that to a road injured animal is poor care. It takes away my confidence that the remainder of care which took place out of sight was of suitable quality.

Meghane! So much information and nice quality. Check into selamectin which is marketed as Revolution by Pfizer. More expensive but a topical application. It will take out roundworms and a few other things. More expensive but it is for cats. Considering it will also kill fleas and ear mites it can be cheaper then a multi-treatment in some cases.

Anyways, I'm going to be late for work if I keep up. Thank-you all again for your input. It helps just to vent.

m & l

Oops, you're right, I just forgot about Revolution because we never use it for just a roundworm treatment- it would be way too expensive for just that. Although you can't use it in debilitated animals, so Lucky wouldn't have been a good candidate for that.

Sometimes venting helps. I know that whenever one of my kids die, I am pretty much mad at the world for a while. It's everybody's fault until I calm down a bit. That's a normal part of the grieving process. You'll work through it eventually. It's hard now.

Feel free to vent whenever you need to. But get to work now LOL!