Ed Smith spoke with Dr. Bruce Ingersoll, Board Officer and Medical Director at Rochester Emergency Veterinary Services
-Dr. Ingersoll explained how they continue to fill the gap with emergency vet car overnight and on weekends to provide people emergency care for their pets
-He explained how the benefits of being a nonprofit will allow them to ensure 24/7 emergency care for pets remains available for the community.
-He said it allows them to focus on their employees, patient care and to ensure that this type of emergency care will be more stable and long lasting in our community.
-They are in the processing of moving to a new building in East Rochester which will give them more space to provide services and have space for animals that need to be hospitalized overnight. They expect to transition into the new space any day now.
-This new space will allow them to expand services like respiratory care, ultrasound scanning, internal medicine and surgical services.
-He said they will have a dedicated cat room which will give a much more peaceful and quiet room for cats when receiving medical care.
-Dr. Ingersoll said that this project is running between $1.5-$2 million dollars but that they will continue to grow and add services overtime. He explained that it would cost around $7 million in equipment to have exactly what used to be at the emergency vet hospital that closed a few years ago.
-Dr. Ingersoll says they have hired more staff but will likely hire more staff once they are fully operational in the new building.
-He says they are coordinating with other pet organizations in the community to build complimentary services and not duplicate programs.
-Since they are a nonprofit, they want to be a resource for the community. Education is going to be a big piece of what they provide in addition to the medical services. Dr. Ingersoll says they plan to do community outreach programs teaching people how to perform basic pet first aid and helping them identify items that could be risky to their pets’ health. The idea is to prevent people from having to bring their pet to the emergency facility.
-Dr. Ingersoll said they are grateful for all the donations they have received and they are still accepting donations.