Cherokee Emergency Veterinary Clinic

Reviews 3

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Kim Castro

Do not take your pet here if Dr. Zach Lane is on duty!! He has no idea what he is doing in regard to exotic care of small pocket pets. We have a beloved pet rat who became ill during Sunday of this past memorial day weekend and began mouth breathing which is a sign of respiratory distress and can be very serious in pet rats. We have had this happen before when we adopted a rat from a local rescue and we were given medicine and a certain protocol for care. Our pet rats also have a specialized exotic vet we use for things like being spayed or neutered, injury, illness, etc. So, we were very familiar with care particularly associated with rats. After 24 hours of trying home care, we decided to take Baby to Cobb Emergency Vet Clinic in Woodstock. Dr. Zach Lane was on duty. When Dr. Lane examined our rat and my husband told him what we had tried to do (based on previous vet and rat rescue group advice) he began shaming him and telling him that he made things worse by treating her at home and now there was nothing they could do for the rat unless they did complete diagnostic testing, put her on IV fluids and oxygenated her overnight. When asked what the total was, Dr. Lane said $1400!! My husband called me and I asked if he could put me on speaker with Dr. Lane and he called back 10 minutes later with Dr. Lane on speaker. He was the MOST rude health care professional that I have ever spoken with. My husband and I were very humble and contrite regarding whatever mistakes we may have made in Babys care. He kept shaming my husband, saying that Baby might have had a chance if we would not have tried to treat her and now we had a choice of either putting her to sleep or paying $1400 to have her treated. I asked if there were any other less expensive options and after some more shaming about us being the ones responsible for her being put to sleep, said he would think about it and that the best thing to do was to put her to sleep and that at most she only had a 25% chance of living. After some thought, Dr. Lane said the best he could do was treat her for $900 but would not give her a very good chance. I am a therapist and by this time I was pretty that this young inexperienced vet less than 2 years out of vet school, was in way over his head and he would rather have us kill our pet than admit that he didnt know what to do and that this was not his area of expertise. My husband who spent years grilling people in court, was sure of the same thing as well and my husband immediately left with Baby. We continued to treat her overnight and took her to our regular exotic pet vet who gave us the same exact protocol that my husband had been doing from the beginning. We continued and the very next day (less than 48 hrs from seeing Dr. Lane), Baby was good as new! She was playing with us, eating, snuggling etc. This morning my husband decided to go back to Cobb Emergency Vet Cherokee and took Baby with him to see Dr. Lane and show him that she was healthy and alive so that he would never do this to any other pet or pets family. He wasnt there but he showed her to the woman at the front desk and explained the situation. Please do not take your pets here if Dr. Zach Lane is working. It almost cost us the life of our beloved pet. Dr. Zach Lane is shaming, pretentious, persnickety and has absolutely no idea what he is doing and he would rather an animal die than ever admit that he is not all knowing veterinarian guru- this man has no empathy, compassion or bedside manner. He is a "kick-them-when-they-are-down" kind of guy. Share review Edit review

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Rob Gibson

We were financial raped by these people. They charged $400.00 to put gauze on my dog. Staff was Rude Dog was brought in because it was bleeding from stitches. Earlier that day at a different vet we had our dog spayed. We were concerned when we discovered blood dripping from the incision. Because it was late evening the only vet open was Cherokee Emergency Vet Clinic. We called and informed Cherokee Emergency of the situation and they said it was quite serious to bring the dog in stat. (We later found out this was an over exaggerated statement. This comment is what started our dilemma, because we believed them! We rushed the dog into the vet. 4 hours later we were leaving with our pet and a $400.00 dollar vet bill. The only thing they did was to put gauze on my dog and the gauze was only the size of a pack of cigarettes. They did nothing else to my dog. No medicine, no stitches, no exploratory surgery, nothing! In fact, when we left they could not even tell me if my pet was bleeding internally or why she was bleeding. Their advice was for me to take my dog back to the vet that did the surgery and ask him what was going on. The next morning we did just that. We took our dog back to our vet and showed him the dog and the vet bill from Cherokee Emergency. He laughed and said I quote... "you have been "FXKCed" He said any vet could have looked at the incision and seen that everything was OK. He explained to us that there would have been swelling around the incision as well as discoloration if there were problems. He told us to take the dog home and enjoy her, she was fine. And he did not charge us for his interpretation of our bill from checkorfee emergeny clinic . Oh by the way , the dog, she is fine and happy. She also did not like checkorfee emergeny clinic. To make a long story short these people took advantage of me, my wife and my dog. They do not care about pets, they care about making money. It would be no different than a mechanic telling you how dangerous it would be to drive on a tire low of air. The mechanic could then scare you by telling you that you could get killed and damage your car by driving on this low tire, but he can help. We put air in your tire, but now take it back to where you bought the tires and have them fix the leak. Oh by the way here is your bill for $400.00 I will never go back; I would operate on my own pet before I took her back to these shysters. I have stopped payment on my credit card and I am willing to take this matter to court. I know if you love your pet like we do you want to help them, but this is not the place! Drive further, call someone else, take the pet to a people doctor, operate on it yourself but do not take it to these scam artists. SCAM SCAM SCAM AVOID AT ALL COST!

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Carla Vazquez

The technician was very nice , but it took over an hour for my cat to be even examen by the doctor. My cat came in with something irritating his eye and I feel bad that he wasnt even examined for over an hour . The technician came into the room and told me the doctor is with other patients but Ill be shortly and that she is sorry for especially since My cat was a new patient. She assured me my cat was doing good but that the doctor has not been able to see him. However, after her coming in I waited another 30+ minutes for the doctor. All I kept hearing was loud banging noises in surrounding rooms but yet no doctor. I understand other animals come and some of them with critical condition and those take priority, however waiting for almost an hour and a half for my cat to be looked at is sad. I ended up leaving without my cat being seen by any doctor. Arrived at 6:50 and left at 8:30. -------------------- Since the technician stated my cat was opening his eye normally in the back , I decided to take him home since they had already taken over an hour and a half to see him . When I got home he was not normal . He kept slightly closing it and it was oozing. I decided I had no other options and went back her . I called to let them know I had just been in and that I was coming back . The Lisa on the phone stated "there is no need for an appointment or to ask for permission to come" . I obviously I already knew that but was letting them know I was still concerned . I came in and it seemed like all the staff knew who I was . Right when I walked into the doors, two technicians walked up to me and my cat and took a good look at him and let me show them what I was concerned about . The front desk lady put me in a room immediately but I think it was because they were trying to please me since they knew I didnt leave too happy. However, they still had me wait over an hour and a half for my cat to get his eye stained to check for scratches. This is ridiculous. If you guys are that busy , should probably start thinking about hiring more. Its bad that you have to keep apologizing to your customers for the crazy time you make them wait for even little things like an exam by the doctor. I arrived at 9:20, got told that the doctor wanted to stained my cats eye at 9:40 then did not heard anything at all until 11:05 and thats only AFTER me asking the front desk the status, (the doctor then came into my room within 5 minutes). The doctor discussed everything well and told me I could wait in the lobby at 11:15 but had to wait for the back to bring my cat and paper for another 25 minutes before I could pay. I do appreciate them making my cat feel better but it seems like they take their time. I did not leave until 11:40 . I am very disappointed.