How to Find a Good Vet (and When to Change)

Most people choose a vet by proximity and then stay for a decade regardless. That's fine if you landed well and costly if you didn't.

Here's what actually distinguishes a good practice, and how to assess yours.

What matters most

Registration. All veterinarians in South Africa must be registered with the South African Veterinary Council. This is a legal requirement. If you're ever unsure, you can verify registration.

Communication. The most under-rated quality. A vet who explains things clearly, answers questions without impatience, and tells you what they don't know is worth more than one with a longer list of qualifications and a poor manner.

Willingness to say "I don't know" and refer. Good vets refer readily to specialists — surgeons, cardiologists, dermatologists, ophthalmologists, oncologists — rather than attempting everything. Reluctance to refer is a warning sign.

Transparent pricing. You should be able to get estimates before procedures, itemised invoices afterwards, and honest answers about cost without awkwardness.

Continuity. Seeing the same vet matters for chronic and complex cases. Large practices with high staff turnover can make this difficult, and it genuinely affects care quality for long-term patients.

Proper after-hours arrangements. Ask what happens at 2am. The answer should be specific.

Pain management. A practice that takes analgesia seriously — multi-modal pain relief, local blocks for dental work, adequate post-operative cover — is a good practice. Ask.

Questions worth asking before you commit

Phone or visit and ask:

"What are your after-hours arrangements?"
"Do you have your own X-ray, ultrasound and in-house laboratory?" In-house bloods mean same-visit results, which matters in emergencies.
"How many vets work here, and can I request the same one?"
"What's your approach to pain relief for routine surgery?"
"Do you offer estimates before procedures?"
"Which specialists do you refer to?"
"Can I look around?" Well-run practices are usually happy to show you the ward and prep areas. Reluctance is informative.
"What monitoring do you use during anaesthesia?" You want to hear about a dedicated person monitoring, IV fluids, and multi-parameter monitoring including capnography.

Reading a practice

Things that suggest quality:

Clean, well-organised, doesn't smell
Staff who are calm with animals and use low-stress handling
Separate cat and dog waiting areas, or at least an effort to separate them
Time taken in consultations — not rushed
The vet examines the animal thoroughly rather than glancing
Records are clearly kept and referred to
They weigh your pet every visit
Nurses who are involved and knowledgeable
They follow up after procedures

Things that suggest caution:

Consultations that feel rushed
Reluctance to explain or answer questions
Aggressive selling of products and supplements
No estimates, or surprise bills consistently higher than quoted
Reluctance to refer
Never weighing your pet
Dismissiveness about pain
High staff turnover

Cost versus quality

Cheap and expensive are both poor proxies for quality. A practice with more equipment costs more to run and charges accordingly — that isn't greed, it's overhead. Equally, an expensive practice isn't automatically better.

What matters is value: are you getting a thorough examination, clear communication and appropriate care for what you're paying?

It's entirely reasonable to ask about cost. Good vets discuss it comfortably. If asking about money makes the conversation awkward, that's a fit problem.

Specific situations worth considering

Cat-only or cat-friendly practices. If you have cats, these are genuinely better. Cats are severely stressed by dogs in waiting rooms, and practices with feline-specific handling training produce much better outcomes and more accurate examinations.

Practices with a strong exotics interest, if you keep rabbits, birds or reptiles. General practice knowledge of these species varies enormously, and a rabbit seen by a vet with no rabbit experience is a real risk.

Behaviour and fear-free approaches. Practices trained in low-stress handling make an enormous difference to anxious animals over a lifetime of visits.

Proximity for emergencies. A brilliant vet ninety minutes away is not much use for bloat.

When to change

Reasonable reasons:

You consistently don't understand what you're being told
Your questions are dismissed
A serious problem was missed that should reasonably have been caught
You feel pressured into treatments you don't understand
Your animal is terrified and nobody attempts to manage it
The practice won't refer when you ask
Costs are consistently inconsistent with estimates
You've lost confidence, for reasons you can't fully articulate

That last one counts. Trust matters in this relationship.

Not necessarily good reasons:

One bad outcome. Medicine has bad outcomes, and even excellent vets lose patients.
A high bill for genuinely complex care
Being told something you didn't want to hear
A disagreement about weight, diet or breeding

How to change

Straightforward, and nobody is offended.

1. Register with the new practice

2. Ask them to request your records from the old practice, or request them yourself. You're entitled to your animal's clinical history.

3. Take copies of blood results, imaging reports and vaccination records if you have them

4. Tell the new vet about ongoing conditions and current medications

You don't need to explain yourself to the old practice.

Second opinions

You are entitled to one at any time, for any reason, and it doesn't mean ending the relationship.

Say plainly: *"I'd like a second opinion on this — could you send my records over?"* Reasonable vets facilitate this without difficulty. A vet who reacts badly to a second opinion request has told you something useful.

For serious diagnoses, major surgery, or an end-of-life decision you're unsure about, a second opinion is a sensible step rather than a slight.

Building a good relationship

Once you've found a practice you trust:

Book longer appointments for complex issues rather than trying to compress
Bring your records — weight trends, video, medication logs
Be honest, including about what you can afford and what you've actually been giving
Ask questions and say when you don't understand
See the same vet where you can

The tracking side of our community exists partly to make that relationship work better — weight trends, medication adherence, episode logs and monthly photos, summarised on one page. Vets consistently say the owners who bring information get better outcomes, because the animal can't give a history and you're the only one who can.