Just as human clients have taken to telehealth for virtual doctor’s visits, pet owners have scheduled virtual veterinarian checkups, all without having to leave their homes.
For owners, it’s a convenient way to get their pets’ health evaluated and avoids the fiasco that comes with persuading an uncooperative furball into its pet carrier.
For dogs, who seem to able to smell the difference between a car ride to the dog park and a ride to the vet from a mile away, it can mean avoiding being led, or dragged, to the car.
Dr. Christine Klippen, an emergency veterinarian for Friendship Hospital for Animals in D.C., said the pet-care facility introduced telehealth during the pandemic, when the emphasis was to provide pet care while keeping people from being exposed to COVID-19.
“But it really didn’t take off the way we thought it would,” Klippen said. That’s despite the fact, Klippen said, that “23 million families got pets during the pandemic.”
There are a number of requirements that have to be met before a veterinary practice can offer telehealth, and that can produce some barriers.
“No. 1, they have to have a valid client-patient relationship, meaning that veterinarian has to have seen the pet within a year” of the first telehealth visit, Klippen said. And, “A lot of states don’t have reciprocity with our licensing.”
Klippen said there’s certainly a future for pet telehealth, but she does not think the technology is there just yet. There have been a number of times when clients struggled with the high-tech house call — from inadequate lighting that made it hard to make a diagnosis; or “They couldn’t find the pet!” Klippen said.
But Klippen stressed the utility of virtual visits can set them apart from in-office ones.
“We very commonly use something called tele-triage,” she explained. “People will send pictures of a scratch or a wound or,” she said, hesitating only slightly, “Diarrhea. I get soooo many pictures of diarrhea.”
Although a little gross, those images can help the vet and client figure out whether an emergency vet visit is needed, or if something can be done until the pet’s next appointment.
Klippen said she thinks more veterinarians will gradually begin using telehealth for actually prescribing specific care; and in the future, pet telehealth could be used more widely.
For Dr. Lisa Lippman, director of Virtual Medicine for Bond Vet, which has 31 hospitals from the D.C. area to Chicago, virtual pet medicine is a large part of their practice.
“All veterinarians are doing telehealth all the time whether they know it or not,” she said, explaining the way that most pet owners end up describing their pets’ problem over the phone before making an in-person appointment.
Lippman said the broad reach of Bond Vet is only possible because not all states require that the initial veterinarian-client relationship has to be established in-person.
“It really depends on the state you’re in,” she said. “The laws in Maryland are such that we do not practice telehealth there,” Lippman said. But in D.C. and Virginia, she said, Bond Vet doctors can practice telehealth medicine.
Asked about cases where telehealth has proven especially useful, Lippman described a case where a client’s own medical condition meant he couldn’t risk getting scratched by his cat, which objected to getting into a crate. Thanks to telehealth, Lippman could prescribe something to calm his cat, enabling him to get the animal to the vet.
“And so that’s a cat that likely would not have gotten care,” Lippman said.
Lippman said after a virtual visit, depending on the day, “I will send about 20% to 30% of the patients to the hospital to be seen after I talk to them.”
While Lippman is a strong proponent of the virtual visit as a great tool for pet care, she said patients should have a physical exam once to twice a year.
“Telehealth does not replace the need for a physical exam yearly,” Lippman said.
And when it comes to telehealth for pets, “It’s another point of care,” Lippman said. “That should not be overlooked.”
