For those of us providing dedicated veterinary end-of-life care, the recent CMA changes raise some interesting questions.
Much of the conversation around the new requirements has understandably focused on traditional first-opinion veterinary practices.
But what if your veterinary business doesn’t look like that?
At Dignipets, our vet directors provide a mobile end-of-life service. We support families with hospice and palliative care, quality-of-life discussions and euthanasia at home. We don’t provide routine vaccinations, surgery or general first-opinion veterinary care, and we don’t operate conventional veterinary premises. That distinction was important enough that we sought clarification on how the new requirements apply to services like ours.
And we suspect we’re not the only end-of-life vets asking these questions.
Join the discussion by clicking the link
Limited service doesn’t necessarily mean outside the rules
One of the important points we’ve been working through is the definition of a Limited Service Provider.
Based on the clarification we’ve received and the work we’ve done internally, we’ve proceeded on the basis that a provider of veterinary euthanasia can fall within the definition of a Limited Service Provider and therefore a First Opinion Practice for the purposes of the requirements. Being entirely mobile does not, by itself, put a veterinary business outside that definition.
That has practical consequences.
For Dignipets, our internal compliance work has identified requirements relevant to areas such as website information, booking communications, pricing, invoices and complaints, while requirements that depend upon having physical premises, such as waiting-room information, don’t translate in the same way to a mobile service.
That’s where it becomes particularly interesting for the growing number of us practising differently.
What does transparency look like in end-of-life care?
Greater transparency is something we’re very supportive of.
But end-of-life veterinary care also has characteristics that make the conversation worth having.
Our clients are often contacting us at one of the most distressing moments of their relationship with their pet.
The final price may involve more than the veterinary visit itself. Depending upon the family’s choices, there may be cremation, collection, caskets or other aftercare arrangements.
A dedicated end-of-life provider also needs to be incredibly clear about what it does not provide.
At Dignipets, for example, our client communications explain that we specialise in hospice support, quality-of-life assessment and home euthanasia, but are not a general practice or emergency out-of-hours service. We therefore advise families that their pet should remain registered with a veterinary practice able to provide routine treatment and emergency care.
So there are important questions for all of us.
How much information should be given before the client books?
How should optional aftercare costs be presented?
How do we make pricing transparent without overwhelming somebody who may already be facing the imminent loss of their pet?
And how do mobile and limited-service providers explain clearly where their clinical responsibility begins and ends?
We don’t think Dignipets should have this conversation alone
There are now many veterinary surgeons across the UK providing dedicated home euthanasia, hospice, palliative and other limited veterinary services.
That’s a positive development for the profession and for pet carers.
More than ten years ago, when Dignipets began, dedicated end-of-life veterinary work was a much less established career path. Today, it’s becoming a distinct area of veterinary practice in its own right. That’s something we’ve previously described internally as becoming part of a wider movement in end-of-life veterinary care.
Which is why we’d like to hear from the other vets doing it.
Maja Redfern and I are considering bringing together a small group of veterinary surgeons working in, running or developing end-of-life services for a vet-to-vet online discussion about the CMA changes and limited-service veterinary practice.
We’re not suggesting we have every answer. Actually, that’s rather the point.
We’d like to share what we’ve learnt so far, hear how other end-of-life veterinary businesses are approaching the changes and identify the questions that still need clearer answers.
Would you join the conversation?
We’re gauging interest before setting a date.
If you’re a veterinary surgeon working in, running or developing an end-of-life veterinary service, we’d love to know whether you’d be interested and, importantly:
What’s the one CMA question you’d most like us to discuss?
This initial discussion will be for veterinary surgeons only.
Merel Taal & Maja Redfern
Dignipets
