Night Service

In case of an emergency outside office hours, please phone the normal practice number 01782 522100, and you will be given the number of our night service.

At nights and weekends after noon we employ a 24-hour deputising service in order to provide the best levels of care for your pet.

Why do we think that this offers a better level of care than the traditional approach? Let us explain…………………

What do we want to achieve with our night service?

1. You tell us that above all else you want your pet to be seen, day or night, without questions asked, so that your pet is seen whenever you are concerned, (and not only if the receptionist in charge wants your pet to be seen!)


2. You also want telephone advice whenever you need it.

Much as we would like to do this ourselves, day and night, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, it is simply not realistic for a small practice to offer this without compromising the sanity of our staff. Nor do we think that this offers a good service for your pets when they are treated the following day by a vet who has been up half the night, and this after a full days work.
We therefore use the ‘VetsNoW’ deputising service based in Stoke. VetsNow are a nationwide company that use the PDSA hospitals at night, using dedicated night vets and nurses who are up throughout the night. We have visited the hospital, and have had surgical cases cared for by them. We have been hugely impressed by their attitude, friendliness, and facilities they offer. They seem very nice people, and highly professional in their approach. Communications about cases have been thorough and highly efficient, meaning that we have our own finger on the pulse of what is happening to our patients in their hospital at all times.

Put it this way, if our own pets were ill out of hours, this is where we would entrust them as a matter of choice!

By using this night service, you and your pet are being offered all the following benefits:

1. Your phone call will be answered by skilled staff throughout the night.


2. The staff employs night vets who are highly experienced in critical care, since they are doing this work every night. As with any aspect of medicine, the more that you do of a particular type, the more skilled one becomes!


3. The vets and nurses work nights only - they will not have worked all day before their shift, and they will not have to work all day after it. They will therefore be fresh, eager to see your pet, and happy to do whatever work is demanded, day or night. No 'leaving it till the morning' because the vet has not had a break for 12 hours!


4. Your pet will get proper round-the-clock monitoring, with TPR's (temperture, pulse, and respiration measurements) every 2 hours through the night. Most practices that promote their own in-house emergency care do not have staff present all night.


5. VetsNow use the high quality hospital facilities of the PDSA, allowing the best levels of care for your pet.

We do appreciate that you will have to take your pet to Stoke. However, as this service only operates at night, your journey to Stoke will usually be when there is relatively little traffic on the road. The Emergency Hospital is easy to find and it should rarely take you more than 30 minutes to get there from Congleton, and obviously less from the northern potteries.

We have a photo-map showing the way to VetNoW, to help you find the hospital with the minimum of difficulty. Please ask at the surgey if you would like a copy of this.

Should you ever have to take your pet to VetsNow for a dire emergency, eg after a road accident, you will find that the staff at the hospital will be ready and waiting for you - no need for them to get dressed, defrost the car, drive to the surgery, open up, get the drip warming etc! They will already be on site and ready to care for your pet.

Please note that an out-of-hours consultation fee will normally be payable at the time of consultation. This is in the region of £90-£100 depending upon the time of night.

Treatment fees for hospitalised patients are normally payable to Vetsnow on discharge. Speak to us about this though if your pet is insured and you end up with a whoppa of a bill.

If your pet is hospitalised, it will have to leave the clinic by 8 am in order for the daily PDSA work to continue. Your pet will return to our facilities and care during the next day. You normally collect your pet yourself, but if you are unable to do this, we can usually arrange for collection ourselves.

Teddy's experience of VetsNoW - by a grateful owner:-

Never heard of them? No, neither had I until Teddy, my 13 year old Chow, had to go to their hospital in Stoke after life saving surgery by Pete for a gastric torsion. Surgically Pete and his team had done all they could for Teddy and said that the vets and nurses at VetsNoW could give him the 24 hour 1:1 care he would need, but I did not want him to go anywhere. I told Pete I would look after him, how could I let strangers have Teddy? Who would hold him when he was in pain? Tell him it would be alright? Stroke him? Fondle his ears? Be there for him when he was frightened? Well they were, they did all of those things as well as providing the specialist care that Teddy needed. Pete and Vets Now saved my dog's life - what wonderful team work. Colin, the vet looking after Teddy, kept me informed of what they were doing and how Teddy was progressing. The nurses, when I rang to enquire after him, were always pleasant and very helpful and told me to ring as often as I wanted day and night. But it was the small things that made the difference, things that only someone who cared for Teddy would notice, and I knew he would be ok. So please don't worry if your pet has to spend time with VetsNoW - they will get the best veterinary care you could wish for, plus loads and loads of TLC until they are back at home with you.

Letter received from Janet Smith, regarding her experiences with Vets Now and Sam:

Just a quick note to say how impressed and grateful we are with the VetsNoW hospital at Stoke. Our elderly cocker spaniel Sam had to be taken there as an emergency by myself recently. The vet and nurses there were waiting (as they were there all the time during the night) and, thanks to their constant care and monitoring, Sam survived a collapse and heart attack. I could visit him during his time there and collected him to come home the next day. The vets faxed all treatments Sam had received over to Pet at Blue House, which arrived the same time as we did, for a quick check up at 8.30am.
Yours gratefully,
Janet Smith

Emergency cover deal : an article in Veterinary Times 17th May 2004

One of the UK’s leading pet charities has signed a long-term national agreement to provide an out-of-hours clinical service in its veterinary hospitals. The PDSA has linked the deal with emergency service group VetsNoW to expand service in PetAid hospitals across the UK.

Eventually the service will cover over 25 hospitals in addition to the network of VetsNoW Services in private practices. The move follows repeated requests by the PDSA Veterinary Staff Association to develop a long-term out-of-hours solution to staffing cover problems.
Trends also apparent in small animal practice include 24-hour cover services being devolved to dedicated emergency providers.

VetsNoW (Vets Night or Weekend) was founded by veterinary surgeon Richard Dixon in I998. Mr Dixon said of his company's ethos: “By removing the practice's need to perform out-of-hours work, we have improved their quality of life, day-to-day performance and morale. Clients have also benefited through the use of the teams of vets and nurses dedicated to emergency work and employed solely for that purpose”.

Rolling programme
PDSA director of Veterinary Services Jan McLoughlin commented; “The rolling programme had been put in place to integrate the out-of-hours service so that most of our PDSA PetAid hospitals will be covered during the next twelve months”.
“This is the first agreement that VetsNoW has signed with a charity and we are very happy to be working with them to offer this comprehensive service. As Britain’s leading veterinary charity, this partnership ensures an improved lifestyle for our hospital staff, whilst creating a new income stream from renting the PDSA PetAid hospital and its facilities to VetsNoW in order to operate the service on our behalf,” she added.

VetsNoW currently provides services to the PDSA’s PetAid Swansea, Gateshead. Stoke-on-Trent, Coventry, Sheffield, Nottingham, Hull and Quinton in Birmingham. More are due to open shortly in Thamesmead, Derby Edinburgh and Bradford.

For more information about VetsNoW visit their website www.vets-now.com