Anonymous said to @ask-drferox: 🐖 How do you go about client education on some topics without offending/scaring them? My grandma-in-law feeds her Yorkie bacon, and I told her that she shouldnt do that (in a nice way), but she said “oh it’s only on the weekends!”. I know high fat foods can lead to pancreatitis, and I just dont know how to give the facts confidently while still keeping the conversation positive.
Sometimes I shrug and do just scare them. I have to be seen as honest and trustworthy to do my job well, but I don’t have to sugar coat everything.
Because I generally don’t know a given pet owner as well as you’d know a family member, I start by trying to gauge how they feel about a situation. It’s important no to come down too harshly on anything straight out of the gate, or people will lie and tell you what they think you want to hear. This helps nothing.
Then I will move onto the fact that I don’t recommend doing that thing, or how I would recommend doing it differently, and why.
Then I will elaborate on the potential or likely consequences of doing the thing they are doing, and, most importantly, what it will cost.
So it boils down to they can either listen to the free advice, or potentially spend over a thousand dollars in the near future. And if they don’t take that advice, at least they’ve been warned and hopefully wont moan too much about the bill.
The script I use for pancreatitis goes something like this:
I bet Yorkie enjoys the bacon, but moderation is key as too much in one go will make his very sick. He’s much, much smaller than we are and can’t handle that much fat very well, especially as he gets older.
Too much fat in one go can induce pancreatitis, and dogs can have mild episodes on and off for a long time before they have a big one. A mild episode might look like a dog that vomits once, or missed one meal, and you almost called the vet but then they were back to normal in the morning. Has he ever done that?
Eventually these little episodes will turn into a BIG episode and he’ll be admitted to hospital because of all the pain, nausea and potential sepsis going on as the pancreas tries to digest itself. Sometimes they even become diabetic as a result. And that diabetes may be temporary as the pancreas heals, or it can be permanent.
He might be in hospital for a week or more if it all goes well, and sometimes it does not go well, and most are usually in hospital for at least three days. You might spend $1000 to $2000, that way, plus ongoing costs for insulin if he is a diabetic then.
Unfortunately pancreatitis becomes more common as dogs get older, and I can’t do anything about him aging, but we can control the fat in his diet.
We often see these cases around Xmas time when the dog gets leftovers, or after a celebration or a big weekend. It’s really common, but better to prevent than cure, right?
It’s okay to provide information that’s scary, so long as it’s not accusatory, because that will make people resistant to change. Sometimes they need boots applied per glutes to Get The Message Across.
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