How do you choose a vet?

Last month, my husband and I purchased and moved into our first home. We were delighted to be able to find a home in our price range with a pretty large (by New Jersey standards) stockade fenced yard, and a nice quiet neighborhood to walk the dogs in. Hooray! Now, we face the problem of finding a new vet close to our new house. Our old vet was good but not great, and given that it would be a half-hour drive to get there, we decided to just find a new one closer to our new home. Plus, we need to also find out what kind of emergency vet services are available 24/7 in our area and pre-program these locations into our car GPS system, because we don’t want to be scrambling to find that information in the face of an actual emergency.
So, how do you go about finding a good vet? I decided to make a list of all the vets in my immediate area and call them to ask some basic questions:

• What are your prices for an annual physical exam, vaccinations, blood work, etc? Do you give the lyme disease vaccination (ticks are very prevalent in this area)?
• What are your (general) prices for emergency/surgical services?
• What are your regular hours and your emergency care hours/availability?
• How long does it usually take to get an appointment?
• How many vets are in your practice? Will I always be seeing the same one? Will they get to know me and my dogs?
• Do you give a rescue discount if I need to bring a BRAT dog (other than my own) in for services?
• Do you have specific experience treating Basenjis? Are you familiar with the diseases that are characteristic of the basenji breed (like Fanconi)?

Beyond this simple research, however, I’m struggling with an even more basic question – whether or not to go on a healthcare “plan” for my dogs. I’m not talking about pet health insurance, which is a pretty charged issue that I’d rather not get into here, but rather I’m talking about something like the national network of Banfield clinics (as an example, for illustrative purposes only – there are many types of similar clinic networks out there to choose from). I’ve heard about these types of networked clinics and their healthcare plans for years and I’ve never lived close enough to one to consider it, but now there’s a Banfield very close to my new home and I stopped in last weekend for some information about their healthcare plans. From what I understand, Banfield clinics are all over the country and if you are on any of their Wellness plans then you can go to any Banfield clinic for covered services. There are different plan levels that cover everything from basic services (annual physical exam, shots, bloodwork, etc) to more extensive services (teeth cleaning, etc), and once you pay the start-up fee then you just pay a monthly premium per dog. The benefit is that once you’re on a plan, you can go to the vet any time you want, without an appointment, and your basic services are covered free of charge (upper-level services will be provided at a discount). That means that my hypochondriac, over-mothering self can take my dogs to the vet any time they get a snarfle (doggie sniffles), and I don’t have to worry about paying $50 per dog just for walking in the door to get a professional opinion. That sounds like great news to me, but is it worth the monthly cost?

Let’s consider this for a second: An average vet visit at the regular vet (not Banfield) seems to cost me around $250 for both of my dogs. I take them once a year for their annuals, and then it seems like we go at least 1-2 more times a year any time we experience an unexpected health issue. Sometimes these visits involve services that are more than “basic” (and so wouldn’t be covered by the Banfield plan), sometimes not. Overall, I seem to spend about $750-$1000 per year on vet care for my two basenjis. The Banfield plan stands to cost me around $100 for the onetime start-up fee, and about $500 per year after that for both dogs. If we have a “good” year, meaning that we don’t have any unexpected health complications, we would be better off just going to the regular vet and paying $250 for our annual services. If we need to go to the vet twice a year, then we break even. If we need to go more than that, we’ll save money if we go on a Banfield-type plan. If only I had a crystal ball!

Apart from the cost, however, my decision about which vet to take the dogs to involves heavy consideration of factors like vet skill, bedside manner, basenji experience, and all the questions I listed above – many of which I can’t discover until I actually go to the vet. I can certainly call them and interview them, but I’m really struggling with balancing all of these issues and considerations to make my decision. The dogs are due for their annual shots in April, so I guess I really need to make a decision soon! Does anyone have any thoughts on this, or experience with these types of clinic plans?