Who may appointments be with?
- Veterinary nurses
- Veterinary Surgeons
- Other members of the team
What are the 5 types of consultations?
- Long term medical cases
- Vaccinations
- Primary consultations
- Euthanasia
- Nurse consultations
What should you do when using the telephone in practice?
- Answer between 2 to 4 rings
- Care with hold
- Always refer to the client record
- Always offer an appointment for any clinical symptoms
- Use pet and client names where appropriate
- Recognise emergencies
What information do you need from the client?
- Name
- When do they want an appointment
- What the nature of the problem is
What do you need to do when the client arrives?
- Identify
- Notify the Vet Surgeon or Vet Nurse
- Determine any special considerations
When should a second opinion be gained?
For conformation of diagnosis only
When should a referral be gained?
For diagnosis and possible treatment from a different or specialist practice
Who should the vet surgeon discuss the case with during referrals?
- The client
- The primary Vet Surgeon
What could be categorised as an emergency?
- Severe bleeding or bleeding that doesn’t stop within 5 minutes
- Bleeding from the nose, mouth or rectum
- Coughing up blood
- Blood in urine
- Choking
- Difficulty breathing
- Persistent gagging or coughing
- Inability to or painful passing of urine or faeces
- Eye injuries
- Ingestion of poison
- Seizures
- Ataxia
- Severe lameness
- Fractured bones
- Obvious pain or anxiety
- Open wounds
- Heat stress/stroke
- Severe vomiting or diarrhoea
- Refusal to eat or drink
- Unconsciousness
- Dystocia
- Abdominal pain
What poisons might an animal accidentally ingest?
- Antifreeze
- Xylitol
- Chocolate
- Rodenticides
- Grapes/raisins
- Household medications
What are signs than an animal is in pain?
- Whining
- Glazed eyes
- Bumping into things
What are signs of heat stress/stroke?
- Panting
- Red tongue
- Weakness
- Dizziness
- Thick sticky saliva
- Vomit
- Pale or red gums
What are signs of potential contagious cases?
- Vomiting
- Diarrhoea
- Nasal discharge
- Ocular discharge
- Coughing
- Itchiness
- Swollen glands
- Pyrexia
What three appointment categories are cases placed into?
- No appointment needed
- Appointment needed in a few days
- Urgent appointment needed
How are triage cases classified?
- First priority
- Second priority
- Third priority
- Fourth priority
What is a first priority triage case?
- Critical patient
- Treatment must be initiated ASAP and should immediately brought to the treatment room
What is a second priority triage case?
- Urgent patient
- Currently stable but may become a first priority patient
- Treatment needs to be initiated within minutes to hours
What is a third priority triage case?
- Patient is stable
- Pressing problem that is not critical
- Treatment should be initiated within hours
What is a fourth priority triage case?
- Patient is completely stable
- Needs evaluation but not urgently
