Better - and easier - veterinary inpatient care (now virtual!)

Inpatient updates present a difficult challenge for the modern veterinary clinic. Using PetsApp, are now sending inpatient updates through our virtual vet platform - making things that little bit easier. Another practical benefit that telemedicine provides in animal care.

You know how it goes when handling veterinary inpatient updates to a concerned pet owner. “Don’t call us, we’ll call you.” But having their pet admitted for veterinary care, even for a day procedure, can be a stressful, worrisome time for a pet parent. Inevitably, they do call - adding a (non-urgent) inbound phone call that disrupts your team’s workflow.

It gets worse though because inevitably the owner calls for the update just when you are trying to take blood from a fractious cat. You can’t get to the phone right now. No problem, you’ll call them back later. Well, actually, that is a problem because that’s another phone call. It’s also another item on your expanding to-do list.

So, by some miracle you not only find 5 minutes to give them a call back but you find a free phone line on which to do so. They don’t answer. Yep, as worried as they are about their pet, they have a life too. And so begins the game of phone-tag that absolutely no one loves. I’m betting this is sounding familiar.

Fortunately, there is an alternative.

With PetsApp hundreds of clinics are now sending inpatient updates through text chat. Many even include a quick photo of the pet having recovered from their in-patient procedure, looking cosy and looked after. This takes seconds, delights the pet owner (and, perhaps more surprisingly, the nursing team!), and eliminates those frustrating, time consuming, phone line congesting games of phone tag described above.

My favourite anecdote here is about a nurse that sent a pet owner a cute photo of their dog recovering from surgery. She said she was just about to feed their dog lunch. The owner replied saying he loves chicken. The nurse was able to reply that she was actually cooking some chicken for him right at that moment. The next photo was of this caring nurse hand feeding their dog some chicken. How do you think that made the pet owner feel? How do you think the alternative game of phone tag compares? Which one takes more time? Inpatient updates via text chat on PetsApp are more personal, higher touch and yet save everyone time.

The beauty of the above is that the nurse was going to care for the dog in this way whether the owner knew about it or not. And do you think busy veterinary teams find time to tell the owner about those sorts of details of their pet’s care during discharge? No, they get missed. So, in this way, you communicate greater value to the owner, demonstrate a higher standard of clinical care, and distribute pet owner goodwill across a larger proportion of your team.