I have had a recent experience with the board and based on my experience, I do not feel the board is justified in raising fees as I do not believe that this board serves the public except for licensing purposes.

As a member of the public, I looked to the board for help when my healthy kitten died following a routine spay procedure. She had her surgery on Jan. 13, 2010 and died on Jan. 14, 2010.

My kitten’s surgery ended at 11:45 am.  At 2:30 pm, we were told her surgery went fine and she was “waking up well.”

At 4:40 pm, the vet’s notations is that “Molly is non responsive in her cage.”  The vet did nothing to treat Molly, the vet did not call us to tell us she needed urgent medical care and the vet did not even document any vital signs.

In the morning, they found Molly had “died overnight”.  We filed a complaint, and like approximately 80% of other complaints filed with the board, the board found that our vet did not violate a reasonable standard of care.  Our complaint was that the vet failed to call us and tell us that our kitten needed urgent medical care.   We would have immediately transferred her to an overnight animal hospital.  Instead, our vets turned off the lights and left Molly to die in the dark and all alone.  This board finds that to be acceptable veterinary practice in VA.  The board has reprimanded vets in the past for failure to notify the pet’s owner that the pet needed urgent medical care but not in Molly’s case.

I do not believe that this board has the ability to adequately investigate complaints that are made by the public and make unbiased judgments when they are reviewing a complaint, as evidenced by their 80% closure rate.  I do not believe that giving more money to the board will improve its ability to do fulfill its duty to thoroughly and fairly investigate complaints.

I attended the last board meeting on July 20^th and made a Public Comment. The board has refused to accurately post my comments to reflect that my concern is related to what the board has determined to be a reasonable standard of care for veterinarians in VA. (My comment was less than 200 words, I narrowed it down to 115 words, and the board still would not post an accurate reflection of my comment).  My comment was that the board has decided that it is an acceptable standard of care for a vet to do nothing, when a healthy kitten is non responsive 5 hours after a routine spay.  The board found no violation in Molly’s case but on July 6, 2010 found a vet in violation for failure to document weights or temperatures on felines. 

I believe that when a citizen and taxpayer takes the time, energy and money to go to the board meeting to make a Public Comment and provides the board with a verbatim text of that comment, the board has a duty to accurately reflect that comment in the minutes of the meeting. 

It is my opinion that the board fails to meet the needs of the public when it fails to have a process for complaints and investigations that is open and transparent and thus the board could continue to produce the same “quality” investigations and adjudications without additional funding.  I think the board could actually mange with less money and in today’s economic environment, I would recommend that the board take a 10% decrease in funding.

It is my belief that the board fails to recognize that it has a duty to the public and part of that duty is to be fair and objective when reviewing complaints and that the board members are public servants.  I believe that the board should give their investigatory duties over to an impartial committee and focus solely on licensing which it is capable of doing.

Part of the rationale in raising the fees is that without increasing the fees, investigations and adjudications of complaints would take longer, our complaint took months and months, and even with that amount of time, the investigator placed at least one false fact in her report about the investigation, we were not allowed to see the investigator’s report to see if there were other inaccuracies.  This needs to be changed, a complainant should have the ability to review the investigator’s report.   The increase fee request cites that “The agency should have sufficient funding to carry out its statutory responsibilities of licensing, investigations and disciplinary proceedings.”

Allowing the board to raise fees, without having a thorough and complete review of the complaint process is not justified.  The current process has many flaws which need to be addressed, in my opinion. If one files a complaint against a medical doctor or an attorney, the complainant is allowed to see the MD’s or attorney’s response. If one files a complaint against a vet, the complainant is not allowed to see the vet’s response.   This is just one of the changes that need to be made in the process, but I do not feel that allowing the board to collect higher fees without a complete outside review of the complaint process is unjustified at this time.

(I can be contacted at dcarey1113@comcast.net .)