Critter Doctor Animal Hospital

Melinda of, Critter Doctor Animal Hospital in Kirkland, Washington helped me at a very critical moment on a Friday afternoon. I realized that I was completely out of prescription cat food and it was on back order everywhere,
due to Covid! Melinda was kind enough to provide me with enough to hold my pet over until the cat food can be delivered!! When you think about what they did for me, stopping everything in the middle of a busy Friday afternoon to go gather up the items, make sure they had a new diet cat food prescription put on file, and when I arrived at the animal hospital, they brought the Prescription cat food right out to my car! Melinda did all this in a kindly and gracious manner, with a smile on her face, and would take no money for this wonderful service! All this at no charge, whatsoever!!! It doesn't get any better than this! Critter Doctor Animal Hospital of Kirkland is the most caring and loving animal care Hospital And veterinary clinic of all the animal hospitals and veterinary clinics I've ever frequented in over 45 years! They are such an asset, not just to the neighborhood, but to the entire community! If I could give Critter Doctor Animal Hospital of Kirkland more than five stars, I would!!!!! Thank you from all of us in the Community for providing our Pets with such wonderful care💕

I am writing this review with the hopeful intent that no one has to experience the nightmare that my husband and I did with this clinic. We had been seeing Dr. Alt who we loved but left the clinic recently. However, before we were able to find another clinic our cat was due for her yearly exam and we decided to go ahead and give the other Dr's a shot (we hadn't been impressed with them previously). We were very surprised to learn she had lost 1/3 of her weight and developed heart murmurs. The blood work showed that she had some abnormal liver functions and suggested $360 ultrasound. We did not feel comfortable pursuing expensive diagnostics (based on pervious experiences). The Dr. suggested that we try steroids. During this time the owner Dr. Bernstein called and spoke with me regarding her health and wanted to do x-rays (no mention of ultra sound).

Within a couple of days of that conversation we awoke around 1 a.m. to our cat constantly meowing. At 4 a.m. she had lost control over her bodily functions and began frantically trying to claw her way out of our windows. We knew she was suffering and there was no other decision at that point but to euthanize her. We called at 9 a.m. when the clinic opened and the receptionist stated we would have to drop her off and the Dr. would then determine if they would be willing to do that. We had her up there 5 mins later and the receptionist told him at that point if the Dr. was unwilling to euthanize we could take her the humane society. We were grateful for the information but confused that this decision was not ours to make.

At 12:30 p.m. we had still heard nothing and called ourselves. My husband was talking to the vet we had never met her nor had she ever seen our cat before and getting nowhere. I asked to speak to her and she immediately was rude, judgmental, and uncaring. She said, “All I know is that I have an order here for euthanasia and you don’t want the ashes back.”. This was said in the rudest way imaginable. She also said she was “busy” but watching our cat she looked “perfectly normal” which was absurd and shocking to me based on her appearance. She had also lost muscular control and was walking like a drunk person when we dropped her off. Through my tears explained what she had been doing the night before & questioned letting animal continue suffering like that. She stated that this had not been explained to her and finally agreed to euthanize her "shortly". My husband heard this entire conversation and told me he had relayed the same info the receptionist.

This was the hardest experience of my life compounded 10 fold by the way the clinic handled it. Having no communication from them for hours and having to ARGUE with them about ending her suffering was beyond appalling. They charged $200 for an exam and the cost of euthanizing her. I would have gotten her ashes but they wanted another $100 for that. I picked up our records for our other 2 pets today and paid the bill, as we will not be going back there. I had a conversation with Dr. Bernstein about how horrible this experience was. She proceeded to blame us for the situation and “lack of communication”. I am sickened by her responses and lack of ownership for the way that they handled the situation. She actually said to me that I should’ve been the one to bring our cat in and not my husband! He is an intelligent man and told them exactly the same things I did when he dropped her off. Irrespective of that it’s obvious that they handled this horribly at every turn. In any case I can’t imagine making excuses for their behavior. I would honestly go anywhere else but this clinic.