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Veterinarians: Business Insights from Homeopathic Medicine Debate

Posted by Tom Lombardo | Sat, Jun 27, 2015 @ 07:00 AM

Americans spent over $30 billion on their pets last year, right in step with the economic recovery, and veterinary clinic owners and managers who expect to see their business expand this year may very well be right.

But according to the latest dvm360.com survey, not even half of veterinarians practicing today would recommend their profession to their kids. Ten years ago more than three out of four would have.

With all this money dedicated to pets, we have to wonder why veterinary medicine professionals feel this way.

The chart below indicates that there’s more than one reason. The biggest one is time management, which probably annoys many professionals besides veterinarians, so we can set that one aside.

However, the next two major causes – difficult clients and the inability to pay – might be ones we can alleviate.

Veterinarian_Payment_Financing

Learning from Difficult Veterinarians

First, let’s look at difficult clients. If you’re making a diagnosis and recommending treatment and the pet owner becomes “difficult,” it may be because what you’re telling them doesn’t match up with what they believe – or, if you’re calling attention to their furry friend’s mortality, what they wish to believe.

We can find an idea about how you might deal with this by looking at a recent conflict within the veterinary profession regarding homeopathic medicine.

 “Homeopathy can be looked on as a method of individualizing a medicine for a patient,” explains a paper from the veterinary section of the National Institutes of Health website. “It is a system of finding a medicine that fits the totality of physical and psychological signs seen in a patient, in order to effect a cure in a deep and lasting way.”

That paper’s authors, obviously, were sympathetic to holistic medicine practitioners. Others evaluate it differently.

“It doesn’t actually work,” writes one veterinarian, adding that “Few of my colleagues in veterinary medicine seem inclined to look at the evidence critically and in depth themselves to see that there is, in fact, no real doubt or legitimate dispute. Money, popularity, and the voice of the passionate minority of believers seem unlikely to yield to mere reason and evidence…”

It came to a head last year, when the American Veterinary Medical Association voted on a resolution that would have “discouraged” members to use homeopathic cures or methodologies.

Fortunately, the resolution was defeated by a 92% margin. We’re not saying this is “fortunate” because we’re from California (although we are very impressed that one of our local veterinarians has managed to once again get everyone wondering if Bigfoot is real).

The homeopathic victory is fortunate because it might be more useful for your client than for your patient.

Homeopathic Remedies for Difficult Clients

When the U.S. Senate hauled in television personality Dr. Oz to question him about the homeopathic-type remedies he touted on his show, things got off to a rough start. Noting that the scientific community was “almost monolithic against” the diet supplements he recommended, the Senators suggested that he was perpetrating a massive scam.

But Oz gave them an answer that might help you:

“If the only message I gave was to eat less and move more, which is the most important thing people need to do, we wouldn’t be very effectively be tackling this challenge, because viewers know these steps and they still struggle,” he said. “So we search for tools and crutches for short-term support so people can jump-start their programs.”

Perhaps a “difficult” client can be pacified with a homeopathic addendum to the actual treatment.

Homeopathic-Veterinary-MedicineIf you’re talking medicine and your client becomes difficult, perhaps you can shift to discussing the “totality of physical and psychological signs” that you see, and direct their attention to your desire to “effect a cure in a deep and lasting way.”

Ask questions. It was recently discovered that a slow blink from a cat is actually a kiss. Has that been happening? We also now know that cats can’t forgive. Could that be relevant to the feline’s condition?

An extensive study of 5,582 urinations determined that healthy dogs prefer “to excrete with the body aligned along the north–south axis.” Has the patient been doing this?

Your recommendation, of course, would then need to include both types of treatment – one for the actual problem, and one for the client’s psychological well-being.

And, thankfully, recommending homeopathic cures needn’t introduce risk. Some of them are quite forgiving. Canned pumpkin, for example, conveniently cures both constipation and diarrhea.

Guaranteed Remedies for Difficult Payments

If the introduction of mild homeopathic concepts and remedies into your practice might help you deal with your second largest source of stress, make sure you’re equally prepared to deal with the third largest: inability to pay.

Homeopathic medicine appeals to people, at least to some degree, because it is so much less expensive. Which is easier to finance: a test for intestinal parasites and a pharmaceutical cure, or a can of pumpkin pie filling? It’s much cheaper to feel like you’re doing something with the second solution.

Keeping the $30 billion in mind, it’s safe to assume that many pet owners would prefer to treat their beloved friend, but the cost of many procedures can be prohibitive for the average American family to handle all at once.

So no matter how you approach the holistic psychology of the situation, you may want to have a thoroughly tested physical solution in place as well.

We have you covered. Many of our veterinarian clients credit one of our services, a multiple check service, with dramatically reducing the incidence of economic euthanasia in their practice. You don’t need to require full payment up front, your client doesn’t need to pass a credit check, you don’t need to finance treatment yourself, and the revenue is guaranteed by us. Click the image below to find out how.

 

hold check, multiple check

 

Topics: Veterinarians

Written by Tom Lombardo