In these pictures, you’ll see Taylor. He’s a loveable, cute guy, right? He had surgery about a year ago to remove a tumor from his hip. Take a look at the other cute picture where I actually have him on my lap. He’s a big dog, isn’t he? Awwwww…
Just about anyone else trying to hold Taylor on their lap would be bit.
Taylor is a rescue dog. He was abused as a puppy, before anyone in my family met him. Most of the time, this isn’t a big deal – unless you try to hold him or pull him by his collar. Then he bites and scratches and thrashes. I’m the only one who can keep him calm at the vet’s. Taylor’s normal vet knows this and works around it. That’s why he keeps seeing her, even though they’re a thirty minute drive away.
And that is why I will never, ever recommend Dayton Emergency Veterinary Clinic (aka Dayton EVC)to anyone.
Very early this morning, Taylor’s stomach was extremely painful. It could have been intestinal torsion, which is a medical emergency. We went to the Dayton EVC (otherwise known as the Dayton Emergency Veterinary Clinic). They decided to do an X-ray.
A technician named Mark tried to take Taylor back. He yanked on Taylor’s leash. Even though Taylor was in pain, Taylor fought against being drug out of the room and pulled his head out of his collar. Mark got a rope leash and used that to drag Taylor back to the exam area.
I told them that because he’d been abused as a puppy, that he’d fight and bite if I didn’t hold him. I told them that other places hadn’t listened to me, and people had gotten scratched and bit. They would not let me go back and hold my dog. They claimed that it was against the law for me to be in an X-ray room with him – a position that everyone at Dayton EVC repeated.
They were wrong.
Per Ohio Administrative Code 3701:1-66-01 Para B(48), the radiation safety rules apply to animal and human patients. Per OAC 3701:1-66-02 Para. H(5a-d), when mechanical devices are not usable the person(s) holding the patient should not be the radiation workers running the machine whenever possible. In other words, if they couldn’t get the dog to hold still for the pictures, they should not have been holding him in place themselves.
They had Taylor back there for almost half an hour trying to take only two X-rays. We could hear Taylor whine and howl several different times, which tells me that they had to try to take the pictures several times. One of those times, we heard Mark cursing through the door of the exam room. Apparently Mark got scratched while Taylor tried to get away.
Remember, Taylor was abused as a puppy, something that Dayton EVC personnel knew from the paperwork and that I repeatedly tried to warn them about.
As a result of this scratch, Dayton EVC is going to report my dog to the Health Department. But Dayton EVC did not follow the radiation safety guidelines as set out in Ohio law, misrepresented the law to keep me from caring for my scared and hurt dog, and ignored repeated warnings about Taylor being a rescue dog and reacting badly to being held. Mark did exactly the same things to Taylor that Taylor’s abusers did, and is now making my dog face the consequences for their lack of empathy.
And that is why I will never, ever recommend Dayton Emergency Veterinary Clinic (aka Dayton EVC)to anyone, especially anyone who has gone to the time, trouble, and effort to save an abused animal.