Our Aim

The Bristol Emergency Veterinary Service provides a premier emergency and critical care service to animals in Bristol and the surrounding area. We know that it is becoming increasingly difficult to balance the increasing demand for less out of hours for Veterinary and nursing staff with the increasing demand for high quality out of hours service for our clients. Our aim is to help bridge this gap by partnering local practices in the provision of emergency and critical care service. This scheme was launched in Spring 2002.

How does it work?

The service is tailor made to meet the individual requirements of each participating practice. The service is provided both on a regular basis or as a 'locum service'.

Services offered include:

Full provision of out of hours service.

We provide a full emergency out of hours service from 6.30pm to 8.30am (or hours to suit individual practices). This can be provided in the following manner:

1. Regular basis, (365 days of the year)

2. Week ends only

3. Week nights only

4. Single nights - this may be useful to fill gaps in your rota.

• All owners are asked to sign a declaration which explains that we cannot provide first opinion services within 12 months of their visit to us.
• Critical cases or those you wish to refer to our experienced small animal clinicians at Bradley Stoke or the Referral team can be kept in at your discretion.

Over night hospitalisation, including 24 glucose curves etc. As our clients continue to expect better and better service it is becoming increasingly hard to justify hospitalising critically ill patients overnight where it is not possible to have staff on-site. We are happy to hospitalise patients overnight and provide treatment as required. All animals that are hospitalised overnight are examined by the overnight veterinary surgeon at regular intervals and have an ongoing treatment plan. Our veterinary night nurse and night care assistant also assist in helping to treat all patients to ensure that their stay with us is as comfotable as possible.

We have provided the Bristol Emergency Veterinary Service for several practices and to date this has been received very well by both the vets and clients involved. We usually ask the client to transport their pet to and from our hospital. However, we do provide an ambulance service for return of animals back to the participating practice if required for a small charge.

Phone answering service.

The phones are taken by Veterinary nurses who 'triage' the cases over the phone. They will offer first aid advice where required and after treatment at our emergency clinic where required.

Home Visits

Whilst home visits are available at any time, the majority of pets are better treated at the Hospital where we have the full range of facilities, medications and trained staff on hand for your needs and comfort.

Sadly when it comes to the time where you may have to make the decision to have your pet put to sleep the Veterinary Surgeon is always able to come to your home for a house visit, which some clients prefer.